| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Christ in Flanders by Honore de Balzac: strange light from some luminary as powerful as the sun, I read the
inscriptions on the bases of the statues--Science, History,
Literature.
The light died out. Again I faced the young girl. Gradually she
slipped into the dreary sheath, into the ragged cere-cloths, and
became an aged woman again. Her familiar brought her a little dust,
and she stirred it into the ashes of her chafing-dish, for the weather
was cold and stormy; and then he lighted for her, whose palaces had
been lit with thousands of wax-tapers, a little cresset, that she
might see to read her prayers through the hours of night.
"There is no faith left in the earth! . . ." she said.
|
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 War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells: the Wey and Thames join. Part of the time we spent helping
two old women to pack a little cart. The Wey has a treble
mouth, and at this point boats are to be hired, and there was
a ferry across the river. On the Shepperton side was an inn
with a lawn, and beyond that the tower of Shepperton Church
--it has been replaced by a spire--rose above the trees.
Here we found an excited and noisy crowd of fugitives. As
yet the flight had not grown to a panic, but there were already
far more people than all the boats going to and fro could
enable to cross. People came panting along under heavy bur-
dens; one husband and wife were even carrying a small out-
War of the Worlds |
