| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Hellenica by Xenophon: wise a truce was made. Agesilaus withdrew to Delphi, where on arrival
he offered to the god a tithe of the produce of his spoils--no less
than a hundred talents.[20] Gylis the polemarch meanwhile withdrew
into Phocis at the head of his troops, and from that district made a
hostile advance into Locris. Here nearly a whole day was spent by the
men in freely helping themselves to goods and chattels out of the
villages and pillaging the corn;[21] but as it drew towards evening
the troops began to retire, with the Lacedaemonians in the rear. The
Locrians hung upon their heels with a heavy pelt of stones and
javelins. Thereupon the Lacedaemonians turned short round and gave
chase, laying some of their assailants low. Then the Locrians ceased
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Sesame and Lilies by John Ruskin: the--to me frightful--discovery, that the most splendid genius in
the arts might be permitted by Providence to labour and perish
uselessly; that in the very fineness of it there might be something
rendering it invisible to ordinary eyes; but that, with this strange
excellence, faults might be mingled which would be as deadly as its
virtues were vain; that the glory of it was perishable, as well as
invisible, and the gift and grace of it might be to us as snow in
summer and as rain in harvest.
That was the first mystery of life to me. But, while my best energy
was given to the study of painting, I had put collateral effort,
more prudent if less enthusiastic, into that of architecture; and in
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