| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Lesser Hippias by Plato: another seal which was also of your own workmanship, and a strigil and an
oil flask, which you had made yourself; you said also that you had made the
shoes which you had on your feet, and the cloak and the short tunic; but
what appeared to us all most extraordinary and a proof of singular art, was
the girdle of your tunic, which, you said, was as fine as the most costly
Persian fabric, and of your own weaving; moreover, you told us that you had
brought with you poems, epic, tragic, and dithyrambic, as well as prose
writings of the most various kinds; and you said that your skill was also
pre-eminent in the arts which I was just now mentioning, and in the true
principles of rhythm and harmony and of orthography; and if I remember
rightly, there were a great many other accomplishments in which you
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Concerning Christian Liberty by Martin Luther: be ascribed. Now this is not done by works, but only by faith of
heart. It is not by working, but by believing, that we glorify
God, and confess Him to be true. On this ground faith alone is
the righteousness of a Christian man, and the fulfilling of all
the commandments. For to him who fulfils the first the task of
fulfilling all the rest is easy.
Works, since they are irrational things, cannot glorify God,
although they may be done to the glory of God, if faith be
present. But at present we are inquiring, not into the quality of
the works done, but into him who does them, who glorifies God,
and brings forth good works. This is faith of heart, the head and
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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 Garden Party by Katherine Mansfield:
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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 War and the Future by H. G. Wells: brought in 1898, and it was the Germans who first brought the war
up to date by entrenching upon the Aisne. We had, of course, a
few aeroplanes at that time, but they were used chiefly as a sort
of accessory cavalry for scouting; our artillery was light and
our shell almost wholly shrapnel.
Now the grades of warfare that have been developed since the
present war began, may be regarded as a series of elaborations
and counter elaborations of the problem which begins as a line of
trenches behind wire, containing infantry with rifles and machine
guns. Against this an infantry attack with bayonet, after
shrapnel fails. This we will call Grade A. To this the
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