| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Alcibiades II by Platonic Imitator: Pericles, you would never attack him?
ALCIBIADES: Never.
SOCRATES: Well, but if Orestes in like manner had not known his mother, do
you think that he would ever have laid hands upon her?
ALCIBIADES: No.
SOCRATES: He did not intend to slay the first woman he came across, nor
any one else's mother, but only his own?
ALCIBIADES: True.
SOCRATES: Ignorance, then, is better for those who are in such a frame of
mind, and have such ideas?
ALCIBIADES: Obviously.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Resurrection by Leo Tolstoy: Nekhludoff's observations, a very large percentage belonging to
this class; among them some of the best of men.
The fifth class consisted of persons who had been far more sinned
against by society than they had sinned against it. These were
castaways, stupefied by continual oppression and temptation, such
as the boy who had stolen the rugs, and hundreds of others whom
Nekhludoff had seen in the prison and out of it. The conditions
under which they lived seemed to lead on systematically to those
actions which are termed crimes. A great many thieves and
murderers with whom he had lately come in contact, according to
Nekhludoff's estimate, belonged to this class. To this class
Resurrection |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne: horse, quoth my father, and do you go directly for Dr. Slop, the man-
midwife, with all our services,--and let him know your mistress is fallen
into labour--and that I desire he will return with you with all speed.
It is very strange, says my father, addressing himself to my uncle Toby, as
Obadiah shut the door,--as there is so expert an operator as Dr. Slop so
near,--that my wife should persist to the very last in this obstinate
humour of hers, in trusting the life of my child, who has had one
misfortune already, to the ignorance of an old woman;--and not only the
life of my child, brother,--but her own life, and with it the lives of all
the children I might, peradventure, have begot out of her hereafter.
Mayhap, brother, replied my uncle Toby, my sister does it to save the
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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 Melmoth Reconciled by Honore de Balzac: he saw himself, in three months' time, condemned to twenty years of
penal servitude. Again a cry broke from him. He was exposed upon the
Place du Palais-de-Justice, and the executioner branded him with a
red-hot iron. Then came the last scene of all; among some sixty
convicts in the prison yard of the Bicetre, he was awaiting his turn
to have the irons riveted on his limbs.
"Dear me! I cannot laugh any more! . . ." said Aquilina. "You are very
solemn, dear boy; what can be the matter? The gentleman has gone."
"A word with you, Castanier," said Melmoth when the piece was at an
end, and the attendant was fastening Mme. de la Garde's cloak.
The corridor was crowded, and escape impossible.
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