| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Flower Fables by Louisa May Alcott: O'er the fair little ones that bloomed at her side.
Night came again, and the fire-flies flew;
But the bud let them pass, and drank of the dew;
While the soft stars shone, from the still summer heaven,
On the happy little flower that had learned the lesson given.
The music-loving Elves clapped their hands, as Star-Twinkle ceased;
and the Queen placed a flower crown, with a gentle smile, upon the
Fairy's head, saying,--
"The little bud's lesson shall teach us how sad a thing is pride,
and that humility alone can bring true happiness to flower and Fairy.
You shall come next, Zephyr."
Flower Fables |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Ann Veronica by H. G. Wells: even our little vicious strains run the same way. Even our
coarseness."
"Coarse?" said Capes, "We're not coarse."
"But if we were?" said Ann Veronica.
"I can talk to you and you to me without a scrap of effort," said
Capes; "that's the essence of it. It's made up of things as
small as the diameter of hairs and big as life and death. . . .
One always dreamed of this and never believed it. It's the
rarest luck, the wildest, most impossible accident. Most people,
every one I know else, seem to have mated with foreigners and to
talk uneasily in unfamiliar tongues, to be afraid of the
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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 Salammbo by Gustave Flaubert: horns of brass. Two lateral staircases led to its flattened summit;
the stones of it could not be seen; it was like a mountain of heaped
cinders, and something indistinct was slowly smoking at the top of it.
Then further back, higher than the candelabrum, and much higher than
the altar, rose the Moloch, all of iron, and with gaping apertures in
his human breast. His outspread wings were stretched upon the wall,
his tapering hands reached down to the ground; three black stones
bordered by yellow circles represented three eyeballs on his brow, and
his bull's head was raised with a terrible effort as if in order to
bellow.
Ebony stools were ranged round the apartment. Behind each of them was
Salammbo |
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 Sesame and Lilies by John Ruskin: their vitality is rather a harm than good.
Without, however, venturing here on any attempt at decision how much
novel reading should be allowed, let me at least clearly assert
this,--that whether novels, or poetry, or history be read, they
should be chosen, not for their freedom from evil, but for their
possession of good. The chance and scattered evil that may here and
there haunt, or hide itself in, a powerful book, never does any harm
to a noble girl; but the emptiness of an author oppresses her, and
his amiable folly degrades her. And if she can have access to a
good library of old and classical books, there need be no choosing
at all. Keep the modern magazine and novel out of your girl's way:
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