| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Iliad by Homer: young man falls by the sword in battle, he may lie where he is
and there is nothing unseemly; let what will be seen, all is
honourable in death, but when an old man is slain there is
nothing in this world more pitiable than that dogs should defile
his grey hair and beard and all that men hide for shame."
The old man tore his grey hair as he spoke, but he moved not the
heart of Hector. His mother hard by wept and moaned aloud as she
bared her bosom and pointed to the breast which had suckled him.
"Hector," she cried, weeping bitterly the while, "Hector, my son,
spurn not this breast, but have pity upon me too: if I have ever
given you comfort from my own bosom, think on it now, dear son,
The Iliad |
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 Apology by Plato: commentary on the situation of affairs from the point of view of the
historian. So in the Apology there is an ideal rather than a literal
truth; much is said which was not said, and is only Plato's view of the
situation. Plato was not, like Xenophon, a chronicler of facts; he does
not appear in any of his writings to have aimed at literal accuracy. He is
not therefore to be supplemented from the Memorabilia and Symposium of
Xenophon, who belongs to an entirely different class of writers. The
Apology of Plato is not the report of what Socrates said, but an elaborate
composition, quite as much so in fact as one of the Dialogues. And we may
perhaps even indulge in the fancy that the actual defence of Socrates was
as much greater than the Platonic defence as the master was greater than
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