The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Euthyphro by Plato: they would only laugh at me, as you say that they laugh at you, the time
might pass gaily enough in the court; but perhaps they may be in earnest,
and then what the end will be you soothsayers only can predict.
EUTHYPHRO: I dare say that the affair will end in nothing, Socrates, and
that you will win your cause; and I think that I shall win my own.
SOCRATES: And what is your suit, Euthyphro? are you the pursuer or the
defendant?
EUTHYPHRO: I am the pursuer.
SOCRATES: Of whom?
EUTHYPHRO: You will think me mad when I tell you.
SOCRATES: Why, has the fugitive wings?
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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 To-morrow by Joseph Conrad: These cottages had one wall in common, shared
in a line of iron railing dividing their front gar-
dens; a wooden fence separated their back gardens.
Miss Bessie Carvil was allowed, as it were of right,
to throw over it the tea-cloths, blue rags, or an
apron that wanted drying.
"It rots the wood, Bessie my girl," the captain
would remark mildly, from his side of the fence,
each time he saw her exercising that privilege.
She was a tall girl; the fence was low, and
she could spread her elbows on the top. Her hands
 To-morrow |