| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Soul of the Far East by Percival Lowell: That Christianity is a religion of love needs no mention; that
Buddhism is equally such is perhaps not so generally appreciated.
But just as the gospel of the disciple who loved and was loved the
most begins its story by telling us of the Light that came into the
world, so none the less surely could the Light of Asia but be also
its warmth. Half of the teachings of Buddhism are spent in
inculcating charity. Not only to men is man enjoined to show
kindliness, but to all other animals as well. The people practise
what their scriptures preach. The effect indirectly on the
condition of the brutes is almost as marked as its more direct
effect on the character of mankind. In heart, at least, Buddhism
|
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 Complete Angler by Izaak Walton: worth a rush. And remember, that his throat be washed very clean, I say
very clean, and his body not washed after he is gutted, as indeed no fish
should be.
Well, scholar, you see what pains I have taken to recover the lost credit
of the poor despised Chub. And now I will give you some rules how to
catch him: and I am glad to enter you into the art of fishing by catching
a Chub, for there is no fish better to enter a young Angler, he is so
easily caught, but then it must be this particular way:
Go to the same hole in which I caught my Chub, where, in most hot
days, you will find a dozen or twenty Chevens floating near the top of
the water. Get two or three grasshoppers, as you go over the meadow:
|
