| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Timaeus by Plato: pleasure, the greatest incitement to evil; then, pain, which deters from
good; also rashness and fear, two foolish counsellors, anger hard to be
appeased, and hope easily led astray;--these they mingled with irrational
sense and with all-daring love according to necessary laws, and so framed
man. Wherefore, fearing to pollute the divine any more than was absolutely
unavoidable, they gave to the mortal nature a separate habitation in
another part of the body, placing the neck between them to be the isthmus
and boundary, which they constructed between the head and breast, to keep
them apart. And in the breast, and in what is termed the thorax, they
encased the mortal soul; and as the one part of this was superior and the
other inferior they divided the cavity of the thorax into two parts, as 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 The Perfect Wagnerite: A Commentary on the Niblung's Ring by George Bernard Shaw: conduct: Shelley himself makes extremely short work of Jupiter,
just as Siegfried does of Fafnir, Mime, and Wotan; and the fact
that Prometheus is saved from doing the destructive part of his
work by the intervention of that very nebulous personification of
Eternity called Demogorgon, does not in the least save the
situation, because, flatly, there is no such person as
Demogorgon, and if Prometheus does not pull down Jupiter himself,
no one else will. It would be exasperating, if it were not so
funny, to see these poets leading their heroes through blood and
destruction to the conclusion that, as Browning's David puts it
(David of all people!), "All's Love; yet all's Law."
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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 Master of Ballantrae by Robert Louis Stevenson: to seek the warmth of bed. The three thus left together had
neither love nor courtesy to share; not one of us would have sat up
one instant to oblige another; yet from the influence of custom,
and as the cards had just been dealt, we continued the form of
playing out the round. I should say we were late sitters; and
though my lord had departed earlier than was his custom, twelve was
already gone some time upon the clock, and the servants long ago in
bed. Another thing I should say, that although I never saw the
Master anyway affected with liquor, he had been drinking freely,
and was perhaps (although he showed it not) a trifle heated.
Anyway, he now practised one of his transitions; and so soon as 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 Men of Iron by Howard Pyle: quadrangle, and so to the Earl's house, he tried to brace his
failing courage to meet the coming interview. Nevertheless, his
heart beat tumultuously as he followed the other down the long
corridor, lit only by a flaring link set in a wrought-iron
bracket. Then his conductor lifted the arras at the door of the
bedchamber, whence came the murmuring sound of many voices, and
holding it aside, beckoned him to enter, and Myles passed within.
At the first, he was conscious of nothing but a crowd of people,
and of the brightness of many lighted candles; then he saw that
he stood in a great airy room spread with a woven mat of rushes.
On three sides the walls were hung with tapestry representing
Men of Iron |
