The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Master and Man by Leo Tolstoy: 'Who are you?' shouted the man, stopping the horse, and
recognizing Vasili Anereevich he immediately took hold of the
shaft, went along it hand over hand till he reached the sledge,
and placed himself on the driver's seat.
He was Isay, a peasant of Vasili Andreevich's acquaintance, and
well known as the principal horse-thief in the district.
'Ah, Vasili Andreevich! Where are you off to?' said Isay,
enveloping Nikita in the odour of the vodka he had drunk.
'We were going to Goryachkin.'
'And look where you've got to! You should have gone through
Molchanovka.'
 Master and Man |
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: not allowed to live in a well-ordered state. Like the Statesmen in the
Meno, they have a divine instinct, but they are narrow and confused; they
do not attain to the clearness of ideas, or to the knowledge of poetry or
of any other art as a whole.
In the Protagoras the ancient poets are recognized by Protagoras himself as
the original sophists; and this family resemblance may be traced in the
Ion. The rhapsode belongs to the realm of imitation and of opinion: he
professes to have all knowledge, which is derived by him from Homer, just
as the sophist professes to have all wisdom, which is contained in his art
of rhetoric. Even more than the sophist he is incapable of appreciating
the commonest logical distinctions; he cannot explain the nature of his own
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