| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from An Open Letter on Translating by Dr. Martin Luther: in the pulpit, the Lord's Prayer, and the Creed. By this means he
sustained many of his Christians, and therefore also his
Christendom, and said nothing about it to these devil's teachers.
Now even though Christians have done some parts of the papal
blasphemy, the papal asses have not yet proved that they did it
gladly. Still less does it prove that they even did the right
thing. All Christians can err and sin, but God has taught them to
pray in the Lord's Prayer for the forgiveness of sins. God could
very well forgive the sins they had to unwillingly, unknowingly,
and under the coercion of the Antichrist commit, without saying
anything about it to the priests and monks! It can,however, be
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Snow Image by Nathaniel Hawthorne: me, as I turn over these leaves! This scene came into my fancy as
I walked along a hilly road, on a starlight October evening; in
the pure and bracing air, I became all soul, and felt as if I
could climb the sky, and run a race along the Milky Way. Here is
another tale, in which I wrapt myself during a dark and dreary
night-ride in the month of March, till the rattling of the wheels
and the voices of my companions seemed like faint sounds of a
dream, and my visions a bright reality. That scribbled page
describes shadows which I summoned to my bedside at midnight:
they would not depart when I bade them; the gray dawn came, and
found me wide awake and feverish, the victim of my own
The Snow Image |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Don Quixote by Miquel de Cervantes: All blemish I'm without,
And as I walk my lily locks
Are trailing on the ground.
And though my nose be rather flat,
And though my mouth be wide,
My teeth like topazes exalt
My beauty to the sky.
Thou knowest that my voice is sweet,
That is if thou dost hear;
And I am moulded in a form
Somewhat below the mean.
Don Quixote |
The fourth excerpt represents the element of Earth. It speaks of physical influences and the impact of the unseen on the visible world, and is drawn from Oscar Wilde Miscellaneous by Oscar Wilde: I gather that the performance was only a qualified success, though
Lugne Poe's triumph as Herod was generally acknowledged. In 1901,
within a year of the author's death, it was produced in Berlin; from
that moment it has held the European stage. It has run for a longer
consecutive period in Germany than any play by any Englishman, not
excepting Shakespeare. Its popularity has extended to all countries
where it is not prohibited. It is performed throughout Europe, Asia
and America. It is played even in Yiddish. This is remarkable in
view of the many dramas by French and German writers who treat of
the same theme. To none of them, however, is Wilde indebted.
Flaubert, Maeterlinck (some would add Ollendorff) and Scripture, are
|
