| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy: X
DESPITE himself Jude recovered somewhat, and worked at his trade
for several weeks. After Christmas, however, he broke down again.
With the money he had earned he shifted his lodgings to a yet
more central part of the town. But Arabella saw that he was not
likely to do much work for a long while, and was cross enough
at the turn affairs had taken since her remarriage to him.
"I'm hanged if you haven't been clever in this last stroke!"
she would say, "to get a nurse for nothing by marrying me!"
Jude was absolutely indifferent to what she said, and indeed,
often regarded her abuse in a humorous light. Sometimes his
Jude the Obscure |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Bride of Lammermoor by Walter Scott: retiring-room, to which they were ushered with all due ceremony,
while the plentiful supper was in the act of being placed upon
the table.
Ravenswood no sooner found himself alone than, impelled by a
thousand feelings, he left the apartment, the house, and the
village, and hastily retraced his steps to the brow of the hill,
which rose betwixt the village and screened it from the tower, in
order to view the final fall of the house of his fathers. Some
idle boys from the hamlet had taken the same direction out of
curiosity, having first witnessed the arrival of the coach and
six and its attendants. As they ran one by one past the Master,
The Bride of Lammermoor |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Sportsman by Xenophon: should be one close by, from making off at the sound of voices. When
they have reached the covert, he will tie the hounds to trees, each
separately, so that they can be easily slipped from the leash, and
proceed to fix the nets, funnel and hayes, as above described. When
that is done, and while the net-keeper mounts guard, the master
himself will take the hounds and sally forth to rouse the game.[19]
Then with prayer and promise to Apollo and to Artemis, our Lady of the
Chase,[20] to share with them the produce of spoil, he lets slip a
single hound, the cunningest at scenting of the pack. [If it be
winter, the hour will be sunrise, or if summer, before day-dawn, and
in the other seasons at some hour midway.] As soon as the hound has
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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 Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau by Honore de Balzac: notariat of Paris abandoning the glorious traditions of preceding
centuries, and producing in a few years as many failures as two
centuries of the old monarchy had produced. The thirst for gold
rapidly acquired has beset even these officers of trust, these
guardians of the public wealth, these mediators between the law
and the people!"
On this text followed an allocution, in which the Comte de Grandville,
obedient to the necessities of his role, contrived to incriminate the
Liberals, the Bonapartists, and all other enemies of the throne.
Subsequent events have proved that he had reason for his apprehension.
"The flight of a notary of Paris who carried off the funds which
Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau |
