| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from St. Ives by Robert Louis Stevenson: Presently, after giving us a cigar apiece, Scott bade us farewell
and disappeared with his daughter over the hills. And when I
applied to Sim for information, his answer of 'The Shirra, man!
A'body kens the Shirra!' told me, unfortunately, nothing.
A more considerable adventure falls to be related. We were now
near the border. We had travelled for long upon the track beaten
and browsed by a million herds, our predecessors, and had seen no
vestige of that traffic which had created it. It was early in the
morning when we at last perceived, drawing near to the drove road,
but still at a distance of about half a league, a second caravan,
similar to but larger than our own. The liveliest excitement was
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Moll Flanders by Daniel Defoe: One of the greatest dangers I was now in, was that I was too
well known among the trade, and some of them, whose hatred
was owing rather to envy than any injury I had done them,
began to be angry that I should always escape when they were
always catched and hurried to Newgate. These were they that
gave me the name of Moll Flanders; for it was no more of
affinity with my real name or with any of the name I had ever
gone by, than black is of kin to white, except that once, as
before, I called myself Mrs. Flanders; when I sheltered myself
in the Mint; but that these rogues never knew, nor could I ever
learn how they came to give me the name, or what the occasion
Moll Flanders |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Love and Friendship by Jane Austen: to the Prince of Wales. We travelled on horseback by preference.
My Mother rode upon our little poney and Fanny and I walked by
her side or rather ran, for my Mother is so fond of riding fast
that she galloped all the way. You may be sure that we were in a
fine perspiration when we came to our place of resting. Fanny has
taken a great many Drawings of the Country, which are very
beautiful, tho' perhaps not such exact resemblances as might be
wished, from their being taken as she ran along. It would
astonish you to see all the Shoes we wore out in our Tour. We
determined to take a good Stock with us and therefore each took a
pair of our own besides those we set off in. However we were
Love and Friendship |
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 The Duchesse de Langeais by Honore de Balzac: lose all by an outbreak of anger.
"Mme la Duchesse, I am in despair that God should have invented
no way for a woman to confirm the gift of her heart save by
adding the gift of her person. The high value which you yourself
put upon the gift teaches me that I cannot attach less importance
to it. If you have given me your inmost self and your whole
heart, as you tell me, what can the rest matter? And besides, if
my happiness means so painful a sacrifice, let us say no more
about it. But you must pardon a man of spirit if he feels
humiliated at being taken for a spaniel."
The tone in which the last remark was uttered might perhaps have
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