| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Weir of Hermiston by Robert Louis Stevenson: rescue with a "Hoot, woman! What do you ken of good taste that has
never been to the ceety?" And Hob, looking on the girl with pleased
smiles, as she timidly displayed her finery in the midst of the dark
kitchen, had thus ended the dispute: "The cutty looks weel," he had
said, "and it's no very like rain. Wear them the day, hizzie; but it's
no a thing to make a practice o'." In the breasts of her rivals, coming
to the kirk very conscious of white under-linen, and their faces
splendid with much soap, the sight of the toilet had raised a storm of
varying emotion, from the mere unenvious admiration that was expressed
in a long-drawn "Eh!" to the angrier feeling that found vent in an
emphatic "Set her up!" Her frock was of straw-coloured jaconet muslin,
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Memorabilia by Xenophon: disastrous than in matters political. Words like these, according to
the accuser, tended to incite the young to contemn the established
constitution, rendering them violent and headstrong. But for myself I
think that those who cultivate wisdom and believe themselves able to
instruct their fellow-citizens as to their interests are least likely
to become partisans of violence. They are too well aware that to
violence attach enmities and dangers, whereas results as good may be
obtained by persuasion safely and amicably. For the victim of violence
hates with vindictiveness as one from whom something precious has been
stolen, while the willing subject of persuasion is ready to kiss the
hand which has done him a service. Hence compulsion is not the method
The Memorabilia |
