| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Edition of The Ambassadors by Henry James: one day to the other, expecting her answer. It's this answer that
will represent, as I believe, the consequences."
Patient and beautiful was her interest. "I see--the consequences of
your speaking for me." And she waited as if not to hustle him.
He acknowledged it by immediately going on. "The question, you
understand, was HOW I should save you. Well, I'm trying it by thus
letting her know that I consider you worth saving."
"I see--I see." Her eagerness broke through.
"How can I thank you enough?" He couldn't tell her that, however,
and she quickly pursued. "You do really, for yourself, consider
it?"
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Apology by Xenophon: ede entautha, en o malist' anthropoi khresmodousin, otan mellosin
apothaneisthai}. "And now, O men who have condemned me, I would
fain prophesy to you, for I am about to die, and that is the hour
at which all men are gifted with prophetic power" (Jowett).
The prophecy proved true. The young man fell a victim to the pleasures
of wine; night and day he never ceased drinking, and at last became a
mere good-for-nothing, worthless alike to his city, his friends, and
himself. As to Anytus, even though the grave has closed upon him, his
evil reputation still survives him, due alike to his son's base
bringing-up and his own want of human feeling.
Socrates did, it is true, by his self-laudation draw down upon him the
The Apology |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Plutarch's Lives by A. H. Clough: the havens were strictly guarded and blocked up, the enemy exercised
them still with skirmishes and combats about their walls, and they
were not only obliged to be continually in arms, but to divide and
prepare themselves for assaults and encounters of every kind, and to
repel every variety of the means of offense employed by a besieging
army.
Timoleon made shift to relieve them in these straits, sending corn
from Catana by small fishing-boats and little skiffs, which commonly
gained a passage through the Carthaginian galleys in times of storm,
stealing up when the blockading ships were driven apart and dispersed
by the stress of weather; which Mago and Hicetes observing, they
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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 The Sportsman by Xenophon: has grown--nor yet that their prime of manhood so far differed. The
lifetime of Cheiron sufficed for all his scholars; the fact being that
Zeus and Cheiron were brethren, sons of the same father but of
different mothers--Zeus of Rhea, and Cheiron of the nymph Nais;[5] and
so it is that, though older than all of them, he died not before he
had taught the youngest--to wit, the boy Achilles.[6]
[1] Or, "This thing is the invention of no mortal man, but of Apollo
and Artemis, to whom belong hunting and dogs." For the style of
exordium L. Dind. cf (Ps.) Dion. "Art. rhet." ad in.; Galen,
"Isagog." ad in.; Alex. Aphrodis. "Probl." 2 proem.
[2] The wisest and "justest of all the centaurs," Hom. "Il." xi. 831.
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