| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Main Street by Sinclair Lewis: indecision of the decisive man; he was convicted, handcuffed,
taken on a train----
She ran to his room. At her nervous push the door swung
sharply in, struck a chair. He awoke, gasped, then in a
steady voice: "What is it, dear? Anything wrong?" She
darted to him, fumbled for the familiar harsh bristly cheek.
How well she knew it, every seam, and hardness of bone, and
roll of fat! Yet when he sighed, "This is a nice visit," and
dropped his hand on her thin-covered shoulder, she said, too
cheerily, "I thought I heard you moaning. So silly of me.
Good night, dear."
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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 New Machiavelli by H. G. Wells: to go on--perhaps all the better for hostility of the kind you'd
get. You know, Remington--you KNOW."
I thought and went back to his earlier point. "If I am rhetorical,
at any rate it's a living feeling behind it. Yes, I remember all
the implications of our aims--very splendid, very remote. But just
now it's rather like offering to give a freezing man the sunlit
Himalayas from end to end in return for his camp-fire. When you
talk of me and my jolly mistress, it isn't fair. That misrepresents
everything. I'm not going out of this--for delights. That's the
sort of thing men like Snuffles and Keyhole imagine--that excites
them! When I think of the things these creatures think! Ugh! But
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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 Ursula by Honore de Balzac: done with a beautiful naivete. Such a life was all the more
meritorious because the abbe was possessed of an erudition that was
vast and varied, and of great and precious faculties. Delicacy and
grace, the inseparable accompaniments of simplicity, lent charm to an
elocution that was worthy of a prelate. His manners, his character,
and his habits gave to his intercourse with others the most exquisite
savor of all that is most spiritual, most sincere in the human mind. A
lover of gayety, he was never priest in a salon. Until Doctor
Minoret's arrival, the good man kept his light under a bushel without
regret. Owning a rather fine library and an income of two thousand
francs when he came to Nemours, he now possessed, in 1829, nothing at
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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 The Economist by Xenophon: [11] Or, "men of fair and noble type"; "true gentlemen." This passage
suggests the "silver lining to the cloud" of slavery.
[12] Cf. Hom. "Il." ix. 413, {oleto men moi nostos, atar kleos
aphthiton estai}, "but my fame shall be imperishable."
XV
Soc. But now, suppose, Ischomachus, you have created in the soul of
some one a desire for your welfare; have inspired in him not a mere
passive interest, but a deep concern to help you to achieve
prosperity; further, you have obtained for him a knowledge of the
methods needed to give the operations of the field some measure of
success; you have, moreover, made him capable of ruling; and, as the
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