| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Mucker by Edgar Rice Burroughs: part in it, especially as I knew nothing of the supposititious
purpose of the cruise until just before we reached Honolulu.
Before that I had been led to believe that it was but a pleasure
trip to the South Pacific that Mr. Divine intended.
"You see, Miss Harding, that I have been as badly deceived
as you. Won't you let me help to atone for my error by being
your friend? I can assure you that you will need one whom
you can trust amongst this shipload of scoundrels."
"Who am I to believe?" cried the girl. "Mr. Divine assures
me that he, too, has been forced into this affair, but by threats
of death rather than deception."
The Mucker |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Cavalry General by Xenophon: endurance;[6] since clearly, if he has to run full tilt against an
armament present, as we picture, in such force that not even our whole
state cares to cope with it, it is plain he must accept whatever fate
is due, where might is right, himself unable to retaliate.
[6] So Jason, "Hell." VI. i. 4.
If, on the contrary, he elect to guard the territory outside the
walls[7] with a number just sufficient to keep a look-out on the
enemy, and to withdraw into safe quarters from a distance whatever
needs protection--a small number, be it observed, is just as capable
of vedette duty, as well able, say, to scan the distant horizon, as a
large; and by the same token men with no great confidence in
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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 United States Declaration of Independence: parchment "facsimiles" I used back in 1971, and which I should not
be able to easily find at this time, including "Brittain."
**The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Declaration of Independence**
#STARTMARK#
The Declaration of Independence of The United States of America
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for
one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected
them with another, and to assume, among the Powers of the earth,
the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and
of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions
of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which
United States Declaration of Independence |
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 Meno by Plato: and Parmenides. The teaching of Spinoza might be described generally as
the Jewish religion reduced to an abstraction and taking the form of the
Eleatic philosophy. Like Parmenides, he is overpowered and intoxicated
with the idea of Being or God. The greatness of both philosophies consists
in the immensity of a thought which excludes all other thoughts; their
weakness is the necessary separation of this thought from actual existence
and from practical life. In neither of them is there any clear opposition
between the inward and outward world. The substance of Spinoza has two
attributes, which alone are cognizable by man, thought and extension; these
are in extreme opposition to one another, and also in inseparable identity.
They may be regarded as the two aspects or expressions under which God or
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