| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from New Poems by Robert Louis Stevenson: Hark! in your dreams do you hear?
Snow has filled the drifted forest;
Ice has bound the . . . stream.
Frost has bound our flowing river;
Snow has whitened all our island brake.
Berried brake and reedy island,
Heaven below and only heaven above azure
Through the sky's inverted image
Safely swam the boat that bore our love.
Dear were your eyes as the day,
Bright ran the stream, bright hung the sky above.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Beyond Good and Evil by Friedrich Nietzsche: and spirit--we shall presumably, IF we must have virtues, have
those only which have come to agreement with our most secret and
heartfelt inclinations, with our most ardent requirements: well,
then, let us look for them in our labyrinths!--where, as we know,
so many things lose themselves, so many things get quite lost!
And is there anything finer than to SEARCH for one's own virtues?
Is it not almost to BELIEVE in one's own virtues? But this
"believing in one's own virtues"--is it not practically the same
as what was formerly called one's "good conscience," that long,
respectable pigtail of an idea, which our grandfathers used to
hang behind their heads, and often enough also behind their
Beyond Good and Evil |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from King Henry VI by William Shakespeare: and Prentices drinking to him.]
1 NEIGHBOUR.
Here, neighbour Horner, I drink to you in a cup of
sack; and fear not, neighbour, you shall do well enough.
2 NEIGHBOUR.
And here, neighbour, here's a cup of charneco.
3 NEIGHBOUR.
And here's a pot of good double beer, neighbour;
drink, and fear not your man.
HORNER.
Let it come, i' faith, and I'll pledge you all; and a
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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 Coxon Fund by Henry James: bloom like a rose, within a month or two."
Miss Anvoy thought a moment. Then, "I should like to see them,"
she said with her fostering smile.
"They're tremendously worth it. You mustn't miss them."
"I'll make George take me," she went on as Mrs. Saltram came up to
interrupt us. She sniffed at this unfortunate as kindly as she had
smiled at me and, addressing the question to her, continued: "But
the chance of a lecture--one of the wonderful lectures? Isn't
there another course announced?"
"Another? There are about thirty!" I exclaimed, turning away and
feeling Mrs. Saltram's little eyes in my back. A few days after
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