| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Travels and Researches in South Africa by Dr. David Livingstone: the original was typed in (manually) twice and electronically compared.
[Note on text: Italicized words or phrases are CAPITALIZED.
Some obvious errors have been corrected.]
Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa.
Also called, Travels and Researches in South Africa;
or, Journeys and Researches in South Africa.
By David Livingstone [British (Scot) Missionary and Explorer--1813-1873.]
David Livingstone was born in Scotland, received his medical degree
from the University of Glasgow, and was sent to South Africa
by the London Missionary Society. Circumstances led him to try to meet
the material needs as well as the spiritual needs of the people he went to,
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from De Profundis by Oscar Wilde: Every single work of art is the fulfilment of a prophecy: for
every work of art is the conversion of an idea into an image.
Every single human being should be the fulfilment of a prophecy:
for every human being should be the realisation of some ideal,
either in the mind of God or in the mind of man. Christ found the
type and fixed it, and the dream of a Virgilian poet, either at
Jerusalem or at Babylon, became in the long progress of the
centuries incarnate in him for whom the world was waiting.
To me one of the things in history the most to be regretted is that
the Christ's own renaissance, which has produced the Cathedral at
Chartres, the Arthurian cycle of legends, the life of St. Francis
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Witch, et. al by Anton Chekhov: and spends on drink the funds of the commune, of the schools, of
the church? A peasant. Who stole from his neighbours, set fire to
their property, gave false witness at the court for a bottle of
vodka? At the meetings of the Zemstvo and other local bodies, who
was the first to fall foul of the peasants? A peasant. Yes, to
live with them was terrible; but yet, they were human beings,
they suffered and wept like human beings, and there was nothing
in their lives for which one could not find excuse. Hard labour
that made the whole body ache at night, the cruel winters, the
scanty harvests, the overcrowding; and they had no help and none
to whom they could look for help. Those of them who were a little
|
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 Westward Ho! by Charles Kingsley: thou looed and trusted us fairly."
Amyas would have certainly taken the yellow fever, but for one
reason, which he himself gave to Cary. He had no time to be sick
while his men were sick; a valid and sufficient reason (as many a
noble soul in the Crimea has known too well), as long as the
excitement of work is present, but too apt to fail the hero, and to
let him sink into the pit which he has so often over-leapt, the
moment that his work is done.
He called a council of war, or rather a sanitary commission, the
next morning; for he was fairly at his wits' end. The men were
panic-stricken, ready to mutiny: Amyas told them that he could not
|
