| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Glimpses of the Moon by Edith Wharton: spend the rest of your life dodging-like our good Hickses,"
Strefford amplified.
The Hickses--but, of course, Nick was with the Hickses! It went
through Susy like a knife, and the dinner she had so lightly
fibbed became a hateful truth. She said to herself feverishly:
"I'll call him up there after dinner--and then he will feel
silly"--but only to remember that the Hickses, in their
mediaeval setting, had of course sternly denied themselves a
telephone.
The fact of Nick's temporary inaccessibility--since she was now
convinced that he was really at the Hickses'--turned her
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Economist by Xenophon: who teach, to teach these easy matters; but for me to lack the
knowledge of them, and most of all if highly useful to the learner,
worse than shame, a scandal.
[12] Or, "the prelude to the piece."
XVI
Isch. First then, Socrates, I wish to demonstrate to you that what is
called[1] "the intricate variety in husbandry"[2] presents no
difficulty. I use a phrase of those who, whatever the nicety with
which they treat the art in theory,[3] have but the faintest practical
experience of tillage. What they assert is, that "he who would rightly
till the soil must first be made acquainted with the nature of the
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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 The Reign of King Edward the Third by William Shakespeare: Hers more than most, mine most and more than more:
Hers more to praise than tell the sea by drops,
Nay, more than drop the massy earth by sands,
And sand by sand print them in memory:
Then wherefore talkest thou of a period
To that which craves unended admiration?
Read, let us hear.
LODOWICK.
'More fair and chaste than is the queen of shades,'--
KING EDWARD.
That line hath two faults, gross and palpable:
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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 Agesilaus by Xenophon: function of the counsellor is uppermost, by the soundness of his
judgment. Of such a man I say, he has obtained by warrant indefeasible
the title peerless.
And if, as a means towards good workmanship, we count among the noble
inventions of mankind the rule and the plummet,[1] no less happily
shall we, who desire to attain a manly excellence, find in the virtue
of Agesilaus a pattern and example. He was God-fearing, he was just in
all his dealings, sound of soul and self-controlled. How then shall we
who imitate him become his opposite, unholy, unjust, tyrannical,
licentious? And, truth to say, this man prided himself, not so much on
being a king over others as on ruling himself,[2] not so much on
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