The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Seraphita by Honore de Balzac: serves in fact as an introduction to his work on the Astral Regions,
has never been published; it is among the oral traditions left by
Swedenborg to the three disciples who were nearest to his heart.
Monsieur Silverichm has written them down. Monsieur Seraphitus
endeavored more than once to talk to me about them; but the
recollection of his cousin's words was so burning a memory that he
always stopped short at the first sentence and became lost in a revery
from which I could not rouse him."
The old pastor sighed as he continued: "The baron told me that the
argument by which the Angel proved to Swedenborg that these bodies are
not made to wander through space puts all human science out of sight
 Seraphita |
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 Boys' Life of Abraham Lincoln by Helen Nicolay: were friendliness or curiosity called to express their good
wishes and take the Republican candidate by the hand.
He wrote no public letters, and he made no speeches beyond a few
words of thanks and greeting to passing street parades. Even the
strictly private letters in which he gave his advice on points in
the campaign were not more than a dozen in number; but all
through the long summer, while welcoming his throngs of visitors,
listening to the tales of old settlers, making friends of
strangers, and binding old friends closer by his ready sympathy,
Mr. Lincoln watched political developments very closely, not
merely to note the progress of his own chances, but with an
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