| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Alcibiades I by Plato: veil over the gloomier events of Athenian history. It exhibits an
acquaintance with the funeral oration of Thucydides, and was, perhaps,
intended to rival that great work. If genuine, the proper place of the
Menexenus would be at the end of the Phaedrus. The satirical opening and
the concluding words bear a great resemblance to the earlier dialogues; the
oration itself is professedly a mimetic work, like the speeches in the
Phaedrus, and cannot therefore be tested by a comparison of the other
writings of Plato. The funeral oration of Pericles is expressly mentioned
in the Phaedrus, and this may have suggested the subject, in the same
manner that the Cleitophon appears to be suggested by the slight mention of
Cleitophon and his attachment to Thrasymachus in the Republic; and 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 Mountains by Stewart Edward White: After this day the Tenderfoot went water-crazy.
Watering the horses became almost a mania with
him. He could not bear to pass even a mud-hole
without offering the astonished Tunemah a chance to fill
up, even though that animal had drunk freely not twenty
rods back. As for himself, he embraced every opportunity;
and journeyed draped in many canteens.
After that it was not so bad. The thermometer
stood from a hundred to a hundred and five or six,
to be sure, but we were getting used to it. Discomfort,
ordinary physical discomfort, we came to accept
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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 Wrong Box by Stevenson & Osbourne: in his mind a dozen grudges, and suspicions, and alarms. It
passed Christchurch by the sea, Herne with its pinewoods,
Ringwood on its mazy river. A little behind time, but not much
for the South-Western, it drew up at the platform of a station,
in the midst of the New Forest, the real name of which (in case
the railway company 'might have the law of me') I shall veil
under the alias of Browndean.
Many passengers put their heads to the window, and among the rest
an old gentleman on whom I willingly dwell, for I am nearly done
with him now, and (in the whole course of the present narrative)
I am not in the least likely to meet another character so decent.
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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 Merry Men by Robert Louis Stevenson: was beginning to take an interest in the talk, for the boy plainly
thought before he spoke, and tried to answer truly. 'It appears
you have a taste for feeling good,' said the Doctor. 'Now, there
you puzzle me extremely; for I thought you said you were a thief;
and the two are incompatible.'
'Is it very bad to steal?' asked Jean-Marie.
'Such is the general opinion, little boy,' replied the Doctor.
'No; but I mean as I stole,' explained the other. 'For I had no
choice. I think it is surely right to have bread; it must be right
to have bread, there comes so plain a want of it. And then they
beat me cruelly if I returned with nothing,' he added. 'I was not
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