| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Walden by Henry David Thoreau: honest men to rebel and revolutionize. What makes this duty the
more urgent is the fact that the country so overrun is not our own,
but ours is the invading army.
Paley, a common authority with many on moral questions, in his
chapter on the "Duty of Submission to Civil Government," resolves
all civil obligation into expediency; and he proceeds to say that
"so long as the interest of the whole society requires it, that is,
so long as the established government cannot be resisted or changed
without public inconveniency, it is the will of God... that the
established government be obeyed, and no longer.... This principle
being admitted, the justice of every particular case of resistance
Walden |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte: I obeyed, so far as to quit the chamber; when, ignorant where the
narrow lobbies led, I stood still, and was witness, involuntarily,
to a piece of superstition on the part of my landlord which belied,
oddly, his apparent sense. He got on to the bed, and wrenched open
the lattice, bursting, as he pulled at it, into an uncontrollable
passion of tears. 'Come in! come in!' he sobbed. 'Cathy, do come.
Oh, do - ONCE more! Oh! my heart's darling! hear me THIS time,
Catherine, at last!' The spectre showed a spectre's ordinary
caprice: it gave no sign of being; but the snow and wind whirled
wildly through, even reaching my station, and blowing out the
light.
Wuthering Heights |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Love Songs by Sara Teasdale: "Love me, love me, love me!"
When he harkens what you say,
Bid him, lest he miss me,
Leave his work or leave his play,
And kiss me, kiss me, kiss me!
Pierrot
Pierrot stands in the garden
Beneath a waning moon,
And on his lute he fashions
A fragile silver tune.
Pierrot plays in the garden,
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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 Hiero by Xenophon: Sicilian word = "more sourly."
Well (Hiero continued), and all these wonderfully-made dishes which
are set before the tyrant, or nine-tenths of them, perhaps you have
observed, are combinations of things acid to the taste, or pungent, or
astringent, or akin to these?[28]
[28] Lit. "and their congeners," "their analogues," e.g. "curries,
pickles, bitters, peppery condiments."
To be sure they are (he answered), unnatural viands, one and all, in
my opinion, most alien to ordinary palates.[29]
[29] Or, "unsuited to man's taste," "'caviare to the general' I name
them."
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