| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs: "Certainly, sir; certainly, sir," exclaimed Professor Porter.
"How could you doubt it?"
"There is young Clayton, you know," suggested Canler. "He has
been hanging about for months. I don't know that Jane cares
for him; but beside his title they say he has inherited a
very considerable estate from his father, and it might not be
strange,--if he finally won her, unless--" and Canler paused.
"Tut--tut, Mr. Canler; unless--what?"
"Unless, you see fit to request that Jane and I be married
at once," said Canler, slowly and distinctly.
"I have already suggested to Jane that it would be desirable,"
Tarzan of the Apes |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Human Drift by Jack London: remove paint. And after things are untangled and you have had
time to appreciate the close shave, you go up to Prince and
reprove him with your choicest vocabulary. And Prince, gazelle-
eyed and tender, offers to shake hands with you for sugar. I
leave it to any one: a boat would never act that way.
We have some history north of the Bay. Nearly three centuries and
a half ago, that doughty pirate and explorer, Sir Francis Drake,
combing the Pacific for Spanish galleons, anchored in the bight
formed by Point Reyes, on which to-day is one of the richest dairy
regions in the world. Here, less than two decades after Drake,
Sebastien Carmenon piled up on the rocks with a silk-laden galleon
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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 Lady Windermere's Fan by Oscar Wilde: gracefully. You would carry off anything gracefully, dear Lord
Augustus.
[When she reaches the door she looks back for a moment at LADY
WINDERMERE. Their eyes meet. Then she turns, and exit C. followed
by LORD AUGUSTUS.]
LADY WINDERMERE. You will never speak against Mrs. Erlynne again,
Arthur, will you?
LORD WINDERMERE. [Gravely.] She is better than one thought her.
LADY WINDERMERE. She is better than I am.
LORD WINDERMERE. [Smiling as he strokes her hair.] Child, you and
she belong to different worlds. Into your world evil has never
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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 Phaedrus by Plato: treatises of rhetoric, however prolific in hard names. When Plato has
sufficiently put them to the test of ridicule he touches, as with the point
of a needle, the real error, which is the confusion of preliminary
knowledge with creative power. No attainments will provide the speaker
with genius; and the sort of attainments which can alone be of any value
are the higher philosophy and the power of psychological analysis, which is
given by dialectic, but not by the rules of the rhetoricians.
In this latter portion of the Dialogue there are many texts which may help
us to speak and to think. The names dialectic and rhetoric are passing out
of use; we hardly examine seriously into their nature and limits, and
probably the arts both of speaking and of conversation have been unduly
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