| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table by Oliver Wendell Holmes: I don't mean that, - I said, - you blessed little saint and seraph!
- if there's an angel missing in the New Jerusalem, inquire for her
at this boarding house! - I don't mean that! I mean that I - that
is, you - am - are - confound it! - I mean that you'll be what most
people call a lady of fortune. And I looked full in her eyes for
the effect of the announcement.
There wasn't any. She said she was thankful that I had what would
save me from drudgery, and that some other time I should tell her
about it. - I never made a greater failure in an attempt to produce
a sensation.
So the last day of summer came. It was our choice to go to the
 The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table |
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 Ion by Plato: seem to be among the persons or places of which you are speaking, whether
they are in Ithaca or in Troy or whatever may be the scene of the poem?
ION: That proof strikes home to me, Socrates. For I must frankly confess
that at the tale of pity my eyes are filled with tears, and when I speak of
horrors, my hair stands on end and my heart throbs.
SOCRATES: Well, Ion, and what are we to say of a man who at a sacrifice or
festival, when he is dressed in holiday attire, and has golden crowns upon
his head, of which nobody has robbed him, appears weeping or panic-stricken
in the presence of more than twenty thousand friendly faces, when there is
no one despoiling or wronging him;--is he in his right mind or is he not?
ION: No indeed, Socrates, I must say that, strictly speaking, he is not in
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