| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Moral Emblems by Robert Louis Stevenson: For mortifying brick and mortar,
Or pocketing the odd piastre
By substituting lath and plaster?
With plan and two-foot rule in hand,
He by the foreman took his stand,
With boisterous voice, with eagle glance
To stamp upon extravagance.
For thrift of bricks and greed of guilders,
He was the Buonaparte of Builders.
The foreman, a desponding creature,
Demurred to here and there a feature:
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from An Open Letter on Translating by Dr. Martin Luther: friend. I received your writing with the two questions or queries
requesting my response. In the first place, you ask why I, in the
3rd chapter of Romans, translated the words of St. Paul:
"Arbitramur hominem iustificari ex fide absque operibus" as "We
hold that the human will be justified without the works of the law
but only by faith." You also tell me that the Papists are causing
a great fuss because St. Paul's text does not contain the word
sola (alone), and that my changing of the words of God is not to
be tolerated. Secondly, you ask if the departed saints intercede
for us. Regarding the first question, you can give the papists
this answer from me - if you so desire.
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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 Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom by William and Ellen Craft: dinner in an old broken plate, with a rusty knife
and fork, and said, "Here, boy, you go in the
kitchen." I took it and went out, but did not
stay more than a few minutes, because I was in a
great hurry to get back to see how the invalid was
getting on. On arriving I found two or three
servants waiting on him; but as he did not feel able
to make a very hearty dinner, he soon finished, paid
the bill, and gave the servants each a trifle, which
caused one of them to say to me, "Your massa is
a big bug"--meaning a gentleman of distinction--
Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom |
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 Schoolmistress and Other Stories by Anton Chekhov: forgive me, a sinner!" He said the same thing now though he had
become rich. What difference was there? And after death Fyodor
rich would not be buried in gold, not in diamonds, but in the
same black earth as the poorest beggar. Fyodor would burn in the
same fire as cobblers. Fyodor resented all this, and, too, he
felt weighed down all over by his dinner, and instead of prayer
he had all sorts of thoughts in his head about his box of money,
about thieves, about his bartered, ruined soul.
He came out of church in a bad temper. To drive away his
unpleasant thoughts as he had often done before, he struck up a
song at the top of his voice. But as soon as he began a policeman
The Schoolmistress and Other Stories |
