| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Soul of the Far East by Percival Lowell: mutual trust once broken. Western civilization has to be truthful,
or perish.
And now for the spirits of the two beliefs.
The soul of any religion realizes in one respect the Brahman idea of
the individual soul of man, namely, that it exists much after the
manner of an onion, in many concentric envelopes. Man, they tell us,
is composed not of a single body simply, but of several layers of body,
each shell as it were respectively inclosing another. The outermost
is the merely material body, of which we are so directly cognizant.
This encases a second, more spiritual, but yet not wholly free from
earthly affinities. This contains another, still more refined; till
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Roads of Destiny by O. Henry: shot that faro dealer in El Paso. I wired Sam Bradshaw's bank to
send me $20,000, and it will get in on the narrow-gauge at 10.35.
You can't let a bank examiner in to count $2,200 and close your
doors. Tom, you hold that examiner. Hold him. Hold him if you have
to rope him and sit on his head. Watch our front window after the
narrow-gauge gets in, and when we've got the cash inside we'll
pull down the shade for a signal. Don't turn him loose till then.
I'm counting on you, Tom.
Your Old Pard,
Bob Buckly,
/Prest. Stockmen's National/.
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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 Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe: again by thousands to revenge the death of their fellows, and I
should only bring upon myself a certain destruction, which, at
present, I had no manner of occasion for. Upon the whole, I
concluded that I ought, neither in principle nor in policy, one way
or other, to concern myself in this affair: that my business was,
by all possible means to conceal myself from them, and not to leave
the least sign for them to guess by that there were any living
creatures upon the island - I mean of human shape. Religion joined
in with this prudential resolution; and I was convinced now, many
ways, that I was perfectly out of my duty when I was laying all my
bloody schemes for the destruction of innocent creatures - I mean
Robinson Crusoe |
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: register our pains and pleasures; whilst at other times such pains and
pleasures are derived conjointly through both soul and body.[10] There
are some pleasures, further, if I may trust my own sensations, which
are conveyed in sleep, though how and by what means and when
precisely, are matters as to which I am still more conscious of my
ignorance. Nor is it to be wondered at perhaps, if the perceptions of
waking life in some way strike more clearly on our senses than do
those of sleep.[11]
[7] Or, "if I may trust my powers of observation I would say that
common men are capable of pains and pleasures conveyed through
certain avenues of sense, as sight through our eyes, sounds
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