| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Kreutzer Sonata by Leo Tolstoy: be no more little hands or little feet, and then what is the use
of the sufferings endured? The cow does not ask all that, and
this is why children are a source of misery. The cow has no
imagination, and for that reason cannot think how it might have
saved the child if it had done this or that, and its grief,
founded in its physical being, lasts but a very short time. It
is only a condition, and not that sorrow which becomes
exaggerated to the point of despair, thanks to idleness and
satiety. The cow has not that reasoning faculty which would
enable it to ask the why. Why endure all these tortures? What
was the use of so much love, if the little ones were to die? The
The Kreutzer Sonata |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Lock and Key Library by Julian Hawthorne, Ed.: presence, the more obtrusive became the suspicions which connected
him with the murder of Lieschen Lehfeldt. How, or upon what
motive, was indeed an utter mystery. He had not mentioned the name
of Lehfeldt. He had not mentioned having before been at Nuremberg.
At Heidelberg the tragedy occurred--or was Heidelberg only a mask?
It occurred to me that he had first ascertained that I had never
been at Heidelberg before he placed the scene of his story there.
Thoughts such as these tormented me. Imagine, then, the horror
with which I heard, soon after my arrival at Salzburg, that a
murder had been committed at Grosshesslohe--one of the pretty
environs of Munich much resorted to by holiday folk--corresponding
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Barlaam and Ioasaph by St. John of Damascus: record the terms; which if thou keep, thou shalt be blessed.
Esteem therefore nought in the present world above God and his
blessings. For what terror of this life can be so terrible as
the Gehenna of eternal fire, that burneth and yet hath no light,
that punisheth and never ceaseth? And which of the goodly things
of this world can give such gladness as that which the great God
giveth to those that love him? Whose beauty is unspeakable, and
power invincible, and glory everlasting; whose good things,
prepared for his friends, exceed beyond comparison all that is
seen; which eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have
entered into the heart of man: whereof mayest thou be shown an
|
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 Critias by Plato: dry sort, which is given us for nourishment and any other which we use for
food--we call them all by the common name of pulse, and the fruits having a
hard rind, affording drinks and meats and ointments, and good store of
chestnuts and the like, which furnish pleasure and amusement, and are
fruits which spoil with keeping, and the pleasant kinds of dessert, with
which we console ourselves after dinner, when we are tired of eating--all
these that sacred island which then beheld the light of the sun, brought
forth fair and wondrous and in infinite abundance. With such blessings the
earth freely furnished them; meanwhile they went on constructing their
temples and palaces and harbours and docks. And they arranged the whole
country in the following manner:--
|
