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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Timaeus by Plato: nature, which are chiefly brought about by the two great agencies of fire
and water. The former is symbolized in the Hellenic tale of young Phaethon
who drove his father's horses the wrong way, and having burnt up the earth
was himself burnt up by a thunderbolt. For there occurs at long intervals
a derangement of the heavenly bodies, and then the earth is destroyed by
fire. At such times, and when fire is the agent, those who dwell by rivers
or on the seashore are safer than those who dwell upon high and dry places,
who in their turn are safer when the danger is from water. Now the Nile is
our saviour from fire, and as there is little rain in Egypt, we are not
harmed by water; whereas in other countries, when a deluge comes, the
inhabitants are swept by the rivers into the sea. The memorials which your
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