| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Economist by Xenophon: Isch. There, Socrates, you are detected "in the very act"; you know as
much about reaping as I do myself.
It looks a little like it (I replied). But I would fain discover
whether I have sound knowledge also about threshing.
Isch. Well, I suppose you are aware of this much: corn is threshed by
beasts of burthen?[7]
[7] Holden cf. Dr. Davy, "Notes and Observations on the Ionian
Islands." "The grain is beaten out, commonly in the harvest field,
by men, horses, or mules, on a threshing-floor prepared extempore
for the purpose, where the ground is firm and dry, and the chaff
is separated by winnowing."--Wilkinson, "Ancient Egyptians," ii.
|
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 Walden by Henry David Thoreau: contemporaries, I had rarely for many years used animal food, or
tea, or coffee, etc.; not so much because of any ill effects which I
had traced to them, as because they were not agreeable to my
imagination. The repugnance to animal food is not the effect of
experience, but is an instinct. It appeared more beautiful to live
low and fare hard in many respects; and though I never did so, I
went far enough to please my imagination. I believe that every man
who has ever been earnest to preserve his higher or poetic faculties
in the best condition has been particularly inclined to abstain from
animal food, and from much food of any kind. It is a significant
fact, stated by entomologists -- I find it in Kirby and Spence --
Walden |
