| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Water-Babies by Charles Kingsley: grow into water-men, ask him how he knows that they do not? and
then, how he knows that they must, any more than the Proteus of the
Adelsberg caverns grows into a perfect newt.
If he says that it is too strange a transformation for a land-baby
to turn into a water-baby, ask him if he ever heard of the
transformation of Syllis, or the Distomas, or the common jelly-
fish, of which M. Quatrefages says excellently well - "Who would
not exclaim that a miracle had come to pass, if he saw a reptile
come out of the egg dropped by the hen in his poultry-yard, and the
reptile give birth at once to an indefinite number of fishes and
birds? Yet the history of the jelly-fish is quite as wonderful as
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Dreams by Olive Schreiner: little newborn babe, and keeps the leaves of the trees pointing upward;
which moves where the jelly-fish sail alone on the sunny seas, and is where
the lichens form on the mountains' rocks.
And the man looked.
And the angel touched him.
But the man bowed his head and shuddered. He whispered--"It is God!"
And the angel re-covered the man's eyes. And when he uncovered them there
was one walking from them a little way off;--for the angel had re-clothed
the soul in its outward form and vesture--and the man knew who it was.
And the angel said, "Do you know him?"
And the man said, "I know him," and he looked after the figure.
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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 To-morrow by Joseph Conrad: black earth, in which the simple flowers she found
time to cultivate appeared somehow extravagantly
overgrown, as if belonging to an exotic clime; and
Captain Hagberd's upright, hale person, clad in
No. 1 sail-cloth from head to foot, would be emer-
ging knee-deep out of rank grass and the tall weeks
on his side of the fence. He appeared, with the col-
our and uncouth stiffness of the extraordinary ma-
terial in which he chose to clothe himself--"for the
time being," would be his mumbled remark to any
observation on the subject--like a man roughened
To-morrow |
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 On Revenues by Xenophon: and the merchant upwards, all seek her, flocking they come; the
wealthy dealers in corn and wine[4] and oil, the owner of many cattle.
And not these only, but the man who depends upon his wits, whose skill
it is to do business and make gain out of money[5] and its employment.
And here another crowd, artificers of all sorts, artists and artisans,
professors of wisdom,[6] philosophers, and poets, with those who
exhibit and popularise their works.[7] And next a new train of
pleasure-seekers, eager to feast on everything sacred or secular,[8]
which may captivate and charm eye and ear. Or once again, where are
all those who seek to effect a rapid sale or purchase of a thousand
commodities, to find what they want, if not at Athens?
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