| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Memorabilia by Xenophon: named advanced at an even pace[31] towards him, but the other, in her
eagerness to outstrip her, ran forward to the youth, exclaiming, 'I
see you, Heracles, in doubt and difficulty what path of life to
choose; make me your friend, and I will lead you to the pleasantest
road and easiest. This I promise you: you shall taste all of life's
sweets and escape all bitters. In the first place, you shall not
trouble your brain with war or business; other topics shall engage
your mind;[32] your only speculation, what meat or drink you shall
find agreeable to your palate; what delight[33] of ear or eye; what
pleasure of smell or touch; what darling lover's intercourse shall
most enrapture you; how you shall pillow your limbs in softest
The Memorabilia |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Lover's Complaint by William Shakespeare: 'Tis promised in the charity of age.
'Father,' she says, 'though in me you behold
The injury of many a blasting hour,
Let it not tell your judgement I am old;
Not age, but sorrow, over me hath power:
I might as yet have been a spreading flower,
Fresh to myself, if I had self-applied
Love to myself, and to no love beside.
'But woe is me! too early I attended
A youthful suit (it was to gain my grace)
Of one by nature's outwards so commended,
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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 The Talisman by Walter Scott: earth, and spun his giddy round before them with singular
agility, which, when contrasted with his slight and wasted
figure, and diminutive appearance, made him resemble a withered
leaf twirled round and round at the pleasure of the winter's
breeze. His single lock of hair streamed upwards from his bald
and shaven head, as if some genie upheld him by it; and indeed it
seemed as if supernatural art were necessary to the execution of
the wild, whirling dance, in which scarce the tiptoe of the
performer was seen to touch the ground. Amid the vagaries of his
performance he flew here and there, from one spot to another,
still approaching, however, though almost imperceptibly, to the
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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 Hiero by Xenophon: touton nomois o Drakon . . . katharon diorisen einai}. "Now in the
laws upon this subject, Draco, although he strove to make it
fearful and dreadful for a man to slay another, and ordained that
the homicide should be excluded from lustrations, cups, and drink-
offerings, from the temples and the market-place, specifying
everything by which he thought most effectually to restrain people
from such a practice, still did not abolish the rule of justice,
but laid down the cases in which it should be lawful to kill, and
declared that the killer under such circumstances should be deemed
pure" (C. R. Kennedy).
[11] e.g. Harmodius and Aristogeiton. See Dem. loc. cit. 138: "The
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