| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Puck of Pook's Hill by Rudyard Kipling: aboard I pray we meet no pirate ships."
'We did not laugh. We were careful. We were afraid
lest we should lose one grain of our gold, for which we
had fought Devils.
"'Where is the Sorcerer?" said I, for Witta was looking
at the Wise Iron in the box, and I could not see the Yellow Man.
"'He has gone to his own country," said he. "He rose
up in the night while we were beating out of that forest in
the mud, and said that he could see it behind the trees.
He leaped out on the mud, and did not answer when we
called; so we called no more. He left the Wise Iron, which
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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 Cratylus by Plato: (te ano rhon). Gune (woman) I suspect to be the same word as goun (birth):
thelu (female) appears to be partly derived from thele (the teat), because
the teat is like rain, and makes things flourish (tethelenai).
HERMOGENES: That is surely probable.
SOCRATES: Yes; and the very word thallein (to flourish) seems to figure
the growth of youth, which is swift and sudden ever. And this is expressed
by the legislator in the name, which is a compound of thein (running), and
allesthai (leaping). Pray observe how I gallop away when I get on smooth
ground. There are a good many names generally thought to be of importance,
which have still to be explained.
HERMOGENES: True.
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