| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from De Profundis by Oscar Wilde: the soldiers gambling and throwing dice for his clothes; the
terrible death by which he gave the world its most eternal symbol;
and his final burial in the tomb of the rich man, his body swathed
in Egyptian linen with costly spices and perfumes as though he had
been a king's son. When one contemplates all this from the point
of view of art alone one cannot but be grateful that the supreme
office of the Church should be the playing of the tragedy without
the shedding of blood: the mystical presentation, by means of
dialogue and costume and gesture even, of the Passion of her Lord;
and it is always a source of pleasure and awe to me to remember
that the ultimate survival of the Greek chorus, lost elsewhere to
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Trooper Peter Halket of Mashonaland by Olive Schreiner: souls of the men that you have bought?'
"And if he shall answer you and say: 'I bought no men's souls! The souls
that I bought were the souls of dogs?' Then ask him this question, say to
him, 'Where are the--'
"And if he cry out, 'You lie, you lie! I know what you are going to say.
What do I know of envoys? Was I ever afraid of the British Government? It
is all a lie!' Then question him no further. But say: 'There was a
rushlight once. It flickered and flared, and it guttered down, and went
out--and no man heeded it: it was only a rushlight.
"'And there was a light once; men set it on high within a lighthouse, that
it might yield light to all souls at sea; that afar off they might see its
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