| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Ion by Plato: the various emotions of pity, wonder, sternness, stamped upon their
countenances when I am speaking: and I am obliged to give my very best
attention to them; for if I make them cry I myself shall laugh, and if I
make them laugh I myself shall cry when the time of payment arrives.
SOCRATES: Do you know that the spectator is the last of the rings which,
as I am saying, receive the power of the original magnet from one another?
The rhapsode like yourself and the actor are intermediate links, and the
poet himself is the first of them. Through all these the God sways the
souls of men in any direction which he pleases, and makes one man hang down
from another. Thus there is a vast chain of dancers and masters and under-
masters of choruses, who are suspended, as if from the stone, at the side
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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 Ebb-Tide by Stevenson & Osbourne: 'Now let's get this chronometer fixed,' said he, and led the
way into the house. It was a fairly spacious place; two
staterooms and a good-sized pantry opened from the main cabin;
the bulkheads were painted white, the floor laid with waxcloth.
No litter, no sign of life remained; for the effects of the dead
men had been disinfected and conveyed on shore. Only on the
table, in a saucer, some sulphur burned, and the fumes set them
coughing as they entered. The captain peered into the starboard
stateroom, where the bed-clothes still lay tumbled in the bunk,
the blanket flung back as they had flung it back from the
disfigured corpse before its burial.
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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 Charmides by Plato: and is ignorant of nothing. Let us suppose that there is such a person,
and if there is, you will allow that he is the most knowing of all living
men.
Certainly he is.
Yet I should like to know one thing more: which of the different kinds of
knowledge makes him happy? or do all equally make him happy?
Not all equally, he replied.
But which most tends to make him happy? the knowledge of what past,
present, or future thing? May I infer this to be the knowledge of the game
of draughts?
Nonsense about the game of draughts.
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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 The Warlord of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs: had ridden their wild thoats across the sacred gardens of the
Temple of Issus, and Tars Tarkas, Jeddak of Thark, fiercest of
them all, had sat upon the throne of Issus and ruled the First Born
while the allies were deciding the conquered nation's fate.
Almost unanimous was the request that I ascend the ancient throne
of the black men, even the First Born themselves concurring in it;
but I would have none of it. My heart could never be with the race
that had heaped indignities upon my princess and my son.
At my suggestion Xodar became Jeddak of the First Born.
The Warlord of Mars |
