| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Tao Teh King by Lao-tze: The simple infant man in him we hail.
2. The unwrought material, when divided and distributed, forms
vessels. The sage, when employed, becomes the Head of all the
Officers (of government); and in his greatest regulations he employs
no violent measures.
29. 1. If any one should wish to get the kingdom for himself, and to
effect this by what he does, I see that he will not succeed. The
kingdom is a spirit-like thing, and cannot be got by active doing. He
who would so win it destroys it; he who would hold it in his grasp
loses it.
2. The course and nature of things is such that
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Idylls of the King by Alfred Tennyson: 'Have at thee then,' said Kay: they shocked, and Kay
Fell shoulder-slipt, and Gareth cried again,
'Lead, and I follow,' and fast away she fled.
But after sod and shingle ceased to fly
Behind her, and the heart of her good horse
Was nigh to burst with violence of the beat,
Perforce she stayed, and overtaken spoke.
'What doest thou, scullion, in my fellowship?
Deem'st thou that I accept thee aught the more
Or love thee better, that by some device
Full cowardly, or by mere unhappiness,
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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 Shadow out of Time by H. P. Lovecraft: had begun to beat a certain rhythm which set my right hand twitching
in unison. I wanted to unlock something, and felt that I knew
all the intricate twists and pressures needed to do it. It would
be like a modern safe with a combination lock.
Dream or not,
I had once known and still knew. How any dream - or scrap of unconsciously
absorbed legend - could have taught me a detail so minute, so
intricate, and so complex, I did not attempt to explain to myself.
I was beyond all coherent thought. For was not this whole experience
- this shocking familiarity with a set of unknown ruins, and this
monstrously exact identity of everything before me with what only
Shadow out of Time |
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 Plutarch's Lives by A. H. Clough: and they indeed have not even the present enjoyment of what they dote
upon, the possibility of the future loss causing them continual pangs,
tremors, and distresses. We must not provide against the loss of wealth
by poverty, or of friends by refusing all acquaintance, or of children
by having none, but by morality and reason. But of this too much.
Now, when the Athenians were tired with a tedious and difficult war that
they conducted against the Megarians for the island Salamis, and made a
law that it should be death for any man, by writing or speaking, to
assert that the city ought to endeavor to recover it, Solon, vexed at
the disgrace, and perceiving thousands of the youth wished for somebody
to begin, but did not dare to stir first for fear of the law,
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