| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Barlaam and Ioasaph by St. John of Damascus: arrive at the place where Barlaam dwelt. His meat was the herbs
that grow in the desert; for he carried nothing with him, as I
have already said, save his own bones, and the ragged garment
that was around him.
But whilst he found some food, though scanty and insufficient,
from the herbs, of water he was quite destitute in that waterless
and dry desert. And so at noon-tide, as he held on his way under
the fierce blaze of the sun, he was parched with thirst in the
hot drought of that desert place, and he suffered the extreme of
anguish. But desire of Christ conquered nature, and the thirst
wherewith he thirsted for God bedewed the heat of thirst for
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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 Golden Sayings of Epictetus by Epictetus: thought much of anything but fodder!
LXIX
I think I know now what I never knew before--the meaning of
the common saying, A fool you can neither bend nor break. Pray
heaven I may never have a wise fool for my friend! There is
nothing more intractable.--"My resolve is fixed!"--Why so madman
say too; but the more firmly they believe in their delusions, the
more they stand in need of treatment.
LXX
--"O! when shall I see Athens and its Acropolis again?"--
Miserable man! art thou not contented with the daily sights that
The Golden Sayings of Epictetus |
