| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Oedipus Trilogy by Sophocles: Through forest brakes and upland groves,
And vainly seeks to fly
The doom that ever nigh
Flits o'er his head,
Still by the avenging Phoebus sped,
The voice divine,
From Earth's mid shrine.
(Str. 2)
Sore perplexed am I by the words of the master seer.
Are they true, are they false? I know not and bridle my tongue for
fear,
Oedipus Trilogy |
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 Philebus by Plato: less, and is always in a state of comparison. All words or ideas to which
the words 'gently,' 'extremely,' and other comparative expressions are
applied, fall under this class. The infinite would be no longer infinite,
if limited or reduced to measure by number and quantity. The opposite
class is the limited or finite, and includes all things which have number
and quantity. And there is a third class of generation into essence by the
union of the finite and infinite, in which the finite gives law to the
infinite;--under this are comprehended health, strength, temperate seasons,
harmony, beauty, and the like. The goddess of beauty saw the universal
wantonness of all things, and gave law and order to be the salvation of the
soul. But no effect can be generated without a cause, and therefore there
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