| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Golden Sayings of Epictetus by Epictetus: supplies, not about revenue, nor yet peace and war, but about
Happiness and Misery, Prosperity and Adversity, Slavery and
Freedom?
Ask you whether a man shall engage in the administration of
the State who has engaged in such an Administration as this? Ask
me too if he shall govern; and again I will answer, Fool, what
greater government shall he hold than he holds already?
CXVIII
Such a man needs also to have a certain habit of body. If he
appears consumptive, thin and pale, his testimony has no longer
the same authority. He must not only prove to the unlearned by
The Golden Sayings of Epictetus |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Thus Spake Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche: And now hath he struck up an awful, melancholy air; alas, he tooted as a
mournful horn to mine ear!
Murderous minstrel, instrument of evil, most innocent instrument! Already
did I stand prepared for the best dance: then didst thou slay my rapture
with thy tones!
Only in the dance do I know how to speak the parable of the highest
things:--and now hath my grandest parable remained unspoken in my limbs!
Unspoken and unrealised hath my highest hope remained! And there have
perished for me all the visions and consolations of my youth!
How did I ever bear it? How did I survive and surmount such wounds? How
did my soul rise again out of those sepulchres?
Thus Spake Zarathustra |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Les Miserables by Victor Hugo: the people from Royalty, and you deliver over your daughters to
the police. Friends, have a care, have mercy. Women, unhappy women,
we are not in the habit of bestowing much thought on them.
We trust to the women not having received a man's education,
we prevent their reading, we prevent their thinking, we prevent
their occupying themselves with politics; will you prevent them from
going to the dead-house this evening, and recognizing your bodies?
Let us see, those who have families must be tractable, and shake hands
with us and take themselves off, and leave us here alone to attend
to this affair. I know well that courage is required to leave,
that it is hard; but the harder it is, the more meritorious.
Les Miserables |
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 Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson by Robert Louis Stevenson: escaped to
THIRD, Saranac Lake, where we now are, and which I believe we mean
to like and pass the winter at. Our house - emphatically 'Baker's'
- is on a hill, and has a sight of a stream turning a corner in the
valley - bless the face of running water! - and sees some hills
too, and the paganly prosaic roofs of Saranac itself; the Lake it
does not see, nor do I regret that; I like water (fresh water I
mean) either running swiftly among stones, or else largely
qualified with whisky. As I write, the sun (which has been long a
stranger) shines in at my shoulder; from the next room, the bell of
Lloyd's typewriter makes an agreeable music as it patters off (at a
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