| 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: will.' The answer does not satisfy Socrates, who fears that he is losing
his touchstone. A profession of seriousness on the part of Callicles
reassures him, and they proceed with the argument. Pleasure and good are
the same, but knowledge and courage are not the same either with pleasure
or good, or with one another. Socrates disproves the first of these
statements by showing that two opposites cannot coexist, but must alternate
with one another--to be well and ill together is impossible. But pleasure
and pain are simultaneous, and the cessation of them is simultaneous; e.g.
in the case of drinking and thirsting, whereas good and evil are not
simultaneous, and do not cease simultaneously, and therefore pleasure
cannot be the same as good.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson by Robert Louis Stevenson: better dealt with on the cast-iron 'gentleman' and duty formula,
with as little fervour and poetry as possible; stoical and short.
. . . There is a new something or other in the wind, which
exercises me hugely: anarchy, - I mean, anarchism. People who
(for pity's sake) commit dastardly murders very basely, die like
saints, and leave beautiful letters behind 'em (did you see
Vaillant to his daughter? it was the New Testament over again);
people whose conduct is inexplicable to me, and yet their spiritual
life higher than that of most. This is just what the early
Christians must have seemed to the Romans. Is this, then, a new
DRIVE among the monkeys? Mind you, Bob, if they go on being
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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 A Treatise on Parents and Children by George Bernard Shaw: who has never read a page of Plato, and is admittedly a dangerously
ignorant man politically, is nevertheless a Socrates compared to the
classically educated gentlemen who discuss politics in country houses
at election time (and at no other time) after their day's earnest and
skilful shooting. Think of the years and years of weary torment the
women of the piano-possessing class have been forced to spend over the
keyboard, fingering scales. How many of them could be bribed to
attend a pianoforte recital by a great player, though they will rise
from sick beds rather than miss Ascot or Goodwood?
Another familiar fact that teaches the same lesson is that many women
who have voluntarily attained a high degree of culture cannot add up
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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 King Henry VI by William Shakespeare: WHITMORE.
Thou shalt have cause to fear before I leave thee.
What, are ye daunted now? now will ye stoop?
1 GENTLEMAN.
My gracious lord, entreat him, speak him fair.
SUFFOLK.
Suffolk's imperial tongue is stern and rough,
Us'd to command, untaught to plead for favour.
Far be it we should honour such as these
With humble suit; no, rather let my head
Stoop to the block than these knees bow to any
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