| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Ion by Plato: you may see a number of pieces of iron and rings suspended from one another
so as to form quite a long chain: and all of them derive their power of
suspension from the original stone. In like manner the Muse first of all
inspires men herself; and from these inspired persons a chain of other
persons is suspended, who take the inspiration. For all good poets, epic
as well as lyric, compose their beautiful poems not by art, but because
they are inspired and possessed. And as the Corybantian revellers when
they dance are not in their right mind, so the lyric poets are not in their
right mind when they are composing their beautiful strains: but when
falling under the power of music and metre they are inspired and possessed;
like Bacchic maidens who draw milk and honey from the rivers when they are
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Before Adam by Jack London: deeper, into a sort of roaring bass. These grew
momentarily louder, and soon I saw him approaching, my
father--at least, by all the evidence of the times, I
am driven to conclude that he was my father.
He was not an extremely prepossessing father, as
fathers go. He seemed half man, and half ape, and yet
not ape, and not yet man. I fail to describe him.
There is nothing like him to-day on the earth, under
the earth, nor in the earth. He was a large man in his
day, and he must have weighed all of a hundred and
thirty pounds. His face was broad and flat, and the
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