| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Sophist by Plato: on the surface of the water; another is carried forward by the current
which flows beneath. The character of an individual, whether he be
independent of circumstances or not, inspires others quite as much as his
words. What is the teaching of Socrates apart from his personal history,
or the doctrines of Christ apart from the Divine life in which they are
embodied? Has not Hegel himself delineated the greatness of the life of
Christ as consisting in his 'Schicksalslosigkeit' or independence of the
destiny of his race? Do not persons become ideas, and is there any
distinction between them? Take away the five greatest legislators, the
five greatest warriors, the five greatest poets, the five greatest founders
or teachers of a religion, the five greatest philosophers, the five
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia by Samuel Johnson: their view, and had hardly names for anything but their clothes and
their food. As I bore a superior character, I was often called to
terminate their quarrels, which I decided as equitably as I could.
If it could have amused me to hear the complaints of each against
the rest, I might have been often detained by long stories; but the
motives of their animosity were so small that I could not listen
without interrupting the tale."
"How," said Rasselas, "can the Arab, whom you represented as a man
of more than common accomplishments, take any pleasure in his
seraglio, when it is filled only with women like these? Are they
exquisitely beautiful?"
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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 Emerald City of Oz by L. Frank Baum: the block for order and said:
"Friends and Fellow Utensils! Our worthy Commander of the Spoon
Brigade, Captain Dipp, has captured the three prisoners you see before
you and brought them here for--for--I don't know what for. So I ask
your advice how to act in this matter, and what fate I should mete out
to these captives. Judge Sifter, stand on my right. It is your
business to sift this affair to the bottom. High Priest Colender,
stand on my left and see that no one testifies falsely in this matter."
As these two officials took their places, Dorothy asked:
"Why is the colander the High Priest?"
"He's the holiest thing we have in the kingdom," replied King Kleaver.
The Emerald City of Oz |
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 The Figure in the Carpet by Henry James: doubtless people to whom torments of such an order appear hardly
more natural than the contortions of disease; but I don't after all
know why I should in this connexion so much as mention them. For
the few persons, at any rate, abnormal or not, with whom my
anecdote is concerned, literature was a game of skill, and skill
meant courage, and courage meant honour, and honour meant passion,
meant life. The stake on the table was of a special substance and
our roulette the revolving mind, but we sat round the green board
as intently as the grim gamblers at Monte Carlo. Gwendolen Erme,
for that matter, with her white face and her fixed eyes, was of the
very type of the lean ladies one had met in the temples of chance.
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