| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Familiar Studies of Men and Books by Robert Louis Stevenson: as of the dead, it would be ungenerous to speak evil; what
little energy he had displayed would be remembered with
piety, when all that he had done amiss was courteously
forgotten. As English folk looked for Arthur; as Danes
awaited the coming of Ogier; as Somersetshire peasants or
sergeants of the Old Guard expected the return of Monmouth or
Napoleon; the countrymen of Charles of Orleans looked over
the straits towards his English prison with desire and
confidence. Events had so fallen out while he was rhyming
ballades, that he had become the type of all that was most
truly patriotic. The remnants of his old party had been the
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Phaedrus by Plato: none in the invention; but when you leave the commonplaces, then there may
be some originality.
PHAEDRUS: I admit that there is reason in what you say, and I too will be
reasonable, and will allow you to start with the premiss that the lover is
more disordered in his wits than the non-lover; if in what remains you make
a longer and better speech than Lysias, and use other arguments, then I say
again, that a statue you shall have of beaten gold, and take your place by
the colossal offerings of the Cypselids at Olympia.
SOCRATES: How profoundly in earnest is the lover, because to tease him I
lay a finger upon his love! And so, Phaedrus, you really imagine that I am
going to improve upon the ingenuity of Lysias?
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