| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Gorgias by Plato: pleasure?
CALLICLES: To be sure.
SOCRATES: But can every man choose what pleasures are good and what are
evil, or must he have art or knowledge of them in detail?
CALLICLES: He must have art.
SOCRATES: Let me now remind you of what I was saying to Gorgias and Polus;
I was saying, as you will not have forgotten, that there were some
processes which aim only at pleasure, and know nothing of a better and
worse, and there are other processes which know good and evil. And I
considered that cookery, which I do not call an art, but only an
experience, was of the former class, which is concerned with pleasure, and
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Gorgias by Plato: which children were the judges, or men who had no more sense than children,
as to which of them best understands the goodness or badness of food, the
physician would be starved to death. A flattery I deem this to be and of
an ignoble sort, Polus, for to you I am now addressing myself, because it
aims at pleasure without any thought of the best. An art I do not call it,
but only an experience, because it is unable to explain or to give a reason
of the nature of its own applications. And I do not call any irrational
thing an art; but if you dispute my words, I am prepared to argue in
defence of them.
Cookery, then, I maintain to be a flattery which takes the form of
medicine; and tiring, in like manner, is a flattery which takes the form of
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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 My Bondage and My Freedom by Frederick Douglass: believed in that paper. My acquaintance with the movement
increased my hope for the ultimate freedom of my race, and I
united with it from a sense of delight, as well as duty.
<277 THE _Liberator_>
Every week the _Liberator_ came, and every week I made myself
master of its contents. All the anti-slavery meetings held in
New Bedford I promptly attended, my heart burning at every true
utterance against the slave system, and every rebuke of its
friends and supporters. Thus passed the first three years of my
residence in New Bedford. I had not then dreamed of the
posibility{sic} of my becoming a public advocate of the cause so
My Bondage and My Freedom |
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 Common Sense by Thomas Paine: they ought to have prudence enough to wish for Independance.
In short, Independance is the only BOND that can tye and keep
us together. We shall then see our object, and our ears will
be legally shut against the schemes of an intriguing, as well,
as a cruel enemy. We shall then too, be on a proper footing,
to treat with Britain; for there is reason to conclude,
that the pride of that court, will be less hurt by treating
with the American states for terms of peace, than with those,
whom she denominates, "rebellious subjects," for terms of accommodation.
It is our delaying it that encourages her to hope for conquest, and our
backwardness tends only to prolong the war. As we have, without any good
Common Sense |
