| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz by L. Frank Baum: escaped being cast among them.
Whenever the Wizard went to sleep he would take the nine tiny piglets
from his pocket and let them run around on the floor of his room to
amuse themselves and get some exercise; and one time they found his
glass door ajar and wandered into the hall and then into the bottom
part of the great dome, walking through the air as easily as Eureka
could. They knew the kitten, by this time, so they scampered over to
where she lay beside Jim and commenced to frisk and play with her.
The cab-horse, who never slept long at a time, sat upon his haunches
and watched the tiny piglets and the kitten with much approval.
"Don't be rough!" he would call out, if Eureka knocked over one of the
Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Pierrette by Honore de Balzac: --look out for yourself! I don't like unpleasant bed-fellows, and
you've pulled the blankets all over to your side. Good-evening."
"You shall see," said Vinet, grasping the colonel's hand
affectionately.
*****
About one o'clock that night three clear, sharp cries of an owl,
wonderfully well imitated, echoed through the square. Pierrette heard
them in her feverish sleep; she jumped up, moist with perspiration,
opened her window, saw Brigaut, and flung down a ball of silk, to
which he fastened a letter. Sylvie, agitated by the events of the day
and her own indecision of mind, was not asleep; she heard the owl.
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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 Beast in the Jungle by Henry James: it made every minute of the day existed quite independently of
discussion. One discussed of course LIKE a hunchback, for there
was always, if nothing else, the hunchback face. That remained,
and she was watching him; but people watched best, as a general
thing, in silence, so that such would be predominantly the manner
of their vigil. Yet he didn't want, at the same time, to be tense
and solemn; tense and solemn was what he imagined he too much
showed for with other people. The thing to be, with the one person
who knew, was easy and natural--to make the reference rather than
be seeming to avoid it, to avoid it rather than be seeming to make
it, and to keep it, in any case, familiar, facetious even, rather
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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 Euthydemus by Plato: are apt to be (Greek). But no arguments equally strong can be urged in
favour of assigning to the Euthydemus any other position in the series.
EUTHYDEMUS
by
Plato
Translated by Benjamin Jowett
PERSONS OF THE DIALOGUE:
Socrates, who is the narrator of the Dialogue.
Crito, Cleinias, Euthydemus, Dionysodorus, Ctesippus.
SCENE: The Lyceum.
CRITO: Who was the person, Socrates, with whom you were talking yesterday
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