| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson by Robert Louis Stevenson: I am trying to write out this haunting bodily sense of absence;
besides, what else should I write of?
Yes, looking back, I think of him as one who was good, though
sometimes clouded. He was the only gentle one of all my friends,
save perhaps the other Walter. And he was certainly the only
modest man among the lot. He never gave himself away; he kept back
his secret; there was always a gentle problem behind all. Dear,
dear, what a wreck; and yet how pleasant is the retrospect! God
doeth all things well, though by what strange, solemn, and
murderous contrivances!
It is strange: he was the only man I ever loved who did not
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Pagan and Christian Creeds by Edward Carpenter: It is obvious that these three streams would mingle and
interfuse with each other a good deal; but as far as
they were separable the first would tend to create Solar heroes
and Sun-myths; the second Vegetation-gods and personifications
of Nature and the earth-life; while the third
would throw its glamour over the other two and contribute
to the projection of deities or demons worshipped
with all sorts of sexual and phallic rites. All three systems
of course have their special rites and times and ceremonies;
but, as, I say, the rites and ceremonies of one
system would rarely be found pure and unmixed with
Pagan and Christian Creeds |
