| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Parmenides by Plato: Certainly.
Then, in either case, the one would be made up of parts; both as being a
whole, and also as having parts?
To be sure.
And in either case, the one would be many, and not one?
True.
But, surely, it ought to be one and not many?
It ought.
Then, if the one is to remain one, it will not be a whole, and will not
have parts?
No.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Pivot of Civilization by Margaret Sanger: about themselves. So great is their hope of relief from that
meaningless and deadening submission to unproductive reproduction,
that only a society pruriently devoted to hypocrisy could refuse to
listen to the voices of these mothers. Respectfully we lend our ears
to dithyrambs about the sacredness of motherhood and the value of
``better babies''--but we shut our eyes and our ears to the unpleasant
reality and the cries of pain that come from women who are to-day
dying by the thousands because this power is withheld from them.
This situation is rendered more bitterly ironic because the self-
righteous opponents of Birth Control practise themselves the doctrine
they condemn. The birth-rate among conservative opponents indicates
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde: gags of his own and was on most friendly terms with the pit.
They were both as grotesque as the scenery, and that looked as if it
had come out of a country-booth. But Juliet! Harry, imagine a girl,
hardly seventeen years of age, with a little, flowerlike face,
a small Greek head with plaited coils of dark-brown hair, eyes that were
violet wells of passion, lips that were like the petals of a rose.
She was the loveliest thing I had ever seen in my life.
You said to me once that pathos left you unmoved, but that beauty,
mere beauty, could fill your eyes with tears. I tell you, Harry, I could
hardly see this girl for the mist of tears that came across me.
And her voice--I never heard such a voice. It was very low at first,
The Picture of Dorian Gray |
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 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne: view of this submarine region."
I had not time to express my surprise at this new proposition, when,
at Captain Nemo's call, an objective was brought into the saloon.
Through the widely-opened panel, the liquid mass was bright with electricity,
which was distributed with such uniformity that not a shadow, not a gradation,
was to be seen in our manufactured light. The Nautilus remained motionless,
the force of its screw subdued by the inclination of its planes:
the instrument was propped on the bottom of the oceanic site, and in a few
seconds we had obtained a perfect negative.
But, the operation being over, Captain Nemo said, "Let us go up;
we must not abuse our position, nor expose the Nautilus too long
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea |
