| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Phaedo by Plato: intelligible and invisible. And the soul of the true philosopher thinks
that she ought not to resist this deliverance, and therefore abstains from
pleasures and desires and pains and fears, as far as she is able;
reflecting that when a man has great joys or sorrows or fears or desires,
he suffers from them, not merely the sort of evil which might be
anticipated--as for example, the loss of his health or property which he
has sacrificed to his lusts--but an evil greater far, which is the greatest
and worst of all evils, and one of which he never thinks.
What is it, Socrates? said Cebes.
The evil is that when the feeling of pleasure or pain is most intense,
every soul of man imagines the objects of this intense feeling to be then
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Enoch Arden, &c. by Alfred Tennyson: Who wrote it, honoring your sweet faith in him,
May trust himself; and spite of praise and scorn,
As one who feels the immeasurable world,
Attain the wise indifference of the wise;
And after Autumn past--if left to pass
His autumn into seeming-leafless days--
Draw toward the long frost and longest night,
Wearing his wisdom lightly, like the fruit
Which in our winter woodland looks a flower.*
*The fruit of the Spindle-tree (Euonymus Europaeus).
EXPERIMENTS.
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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 Off on a Comet by Jules Verne: in the heart of equatorial Africa; to which Ben Zoof replied, with the
utmost dignity, that he was born at Montmartre, which was all the same.
The worthy fellow was unwilling to own that, even in the matter of heat,
the tropics could in any way surpass his own much-loved home.
This unprecedented temperature very soon began to take effect upon
the products of the soil. The sap rose rapidly in the trees,
so that in the course of a few days buds, leaves, flowers, and fruit
had come to full maturity. It was the same with the cereals;
wheat and maize sprouted and ripened as if by magic,
and for a while a rank and luxuriant pasturage clothed
the meadows. Summer and autumn seemed blended into one.
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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 Poems by Bronte Sisters: For the atoning hour to come.
To that man my faith is given,
Therefore, soldier, cease to sue;
While God reigns in earth and heaven,
I to him will still be true!
EVENING SOLACE.
The human heart has hidden treasures,
In secret kept, in silence sealed;--
The thoughts, the hopes, the dreams, the pleasures,
Whose charms were broken if revealed.
And days may pass in gay confusion,
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