| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe: "I advise you to keep them on pretty strictly," said George.
"Your slender paw might bring us all out. Now, Mrs. Smyth, you
are to go under our charge, and be our aunty,--you mind."
"I've heard," said Mrs. Smyth, "that there have been men down,
warning all the packet captains against a man and woman, with
a little boy."
"They have!" said George. "Well, if we see any such people,
we can tell them."
A hack now drove to the door, and the friendly family who had
received the fugitives crowded around them with farewell greetings.
The disguises the party had assumed were in accordance with
Uncle Tom's Cabin |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Virginian by Owen Wister: swallowin' all the frawgs Tulare could throw at 'em. So he--"
"Lorenzo?" said the enthusiast.
"Yes, Lorenzo Delmonico. He bid a dollar a tank higher. An' Saynt
Augustine raised him fifty cents. An' Lorenzo raised him a dollar
An' Saynt Augustine shoved her up three Lorenzo he didn't expect
Philadelphia would go that high, and he got hot in the collar,
an' flew round his kitchen in New York, an' claimed he'd twist
Saynt Augustine's Domingo tail for him and crack his ossified
system. Lorenzo raised his language to a high temperature, they
say. An' then quite sudden off he starts for Tulare. He buys
tickets over the Santa Fe, and he goes a-fannin' and a-foggin'.
The Virginian |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Gorgias by Plato: gods and to men;--for he would not be temperate if he did not? Certainly
he will do what is proper. In his relation to other men he will do what is
just; and in his relation to the gods he will do what is holy; and he who
does what is just and holy must be just and holy? Very true. And must he
not be courageous? for the duty of a temperate man is not to follow or to
avoid what he ought not, but what he ought, whether things or men or
pleasures or pains, and patiently to endure when he ought; and therefore,
Callicles, the temperate man, being, as we have described, also just and
courageous and holy, cannot be other than a perfectly good man, nor can the
good man do otherwise than well and perfectly whatever he does; and he who
does well must of necessity be happy and blessed, and the evil man who does
|
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 Apology by Xenophon: long to the slavish employment which his father has prepared for him,
but, in the absence of any earnest friend and guardian, he is like to
be led into some base passion and go to great lengths in depravity."
[55] Son of Anthemion. See Plat. "Men." 90 B, {airountai goun auton
epi tas megistas arkhas}, Plut. "Alc." 4; id. "Coriol." 14;
Aristot. "Ath. Pol." 27, 25, re {to dekazein}; 34, 23. A moderate
oligarch; cf. Xen. "Hell." II. iii. 42, 44; Schol. Cod. Clarkiani
ad Plat. "Apol." 18 B ap. L. Dind. ad loc.; cf. Diod. xiii. 64.
[56] Cf. Plat. "Apol." 23 E.
[57] e.g. Patroclus dying predicts the death of Hector who had slain
him, "Il." xvi. 851 foll.; and Hector that of Achilles, "Il."
The Apology |
