| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Tom Sawyer, Detective by Mark Twain: and do for us, sure. But I didn't have no real hope.
I knowed we could get him drunk--he was always ready
for that--but what's the good of it? You might search him
a year and never find--"Well, right there I catched my
breath and broke off my thought! For an idea went ripping
through my head that tore my brains to rags--and land,
but I felt gay and good! You see, I had had my boots off,
to unswell my feet, and just then I took up one of them
to put it on, and I catched a glimpse of the heel-bottom,
and it just took my breath away. You remember about that
puzzlesome little screwdriver?"
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Hunting of the Snark by Lewis Carroll: "And proceed without further remark
To the day when you took me aboard of your ship
To help you in hunting the Snark.
"A dear uncle of mine (after whom I was named)
Remarked, when I bade him farewell--"
"Oh, skip your dear uncle!" the Bellman exclaimed,
As he angrily tingled his bell.
"He remarked to me then," said that mildest of men,
" 'If your Snark be a Snark, that is right:
Fetch it home by all means--you may serve it with greens,
And it's handy for striking a light.
The Hunting of the Snark |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Blue Flower by Henry van Dyke: with awe and fear, the faces of all who looked at them; and over
all the flickering, dancing radiance of the flames played and
glimmered like a faint, vanishing tinge of blood on snow.
The only figure untouched by the glow was the old priest,
Hunrad, with his long, spectral robe, flowing hair and beard,
and dead-pale face, who stood with his back to the fire and
advanced slowly to meet the strangers.
"Who are you? Whence come you, and what seek you here?"
"Your kinsman am I, of the German brotherhood," answered
Winfried, "and from England, beyond the sea, have I come to
bring you a greeting from that land, and a message from the
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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 The Passionate Pilgrim by William Shakespeare: Yet at my parting sweetly did she smile,
In scorn or friendship, nill I construe whether:
'T may be, she joy'd to jest at my exile,
'T may be, again to make me wander thither:
'Wander,' a word for shadows like myself,
As take the pain, but cannot pluck the pelf.
XV.
Lord, how mine eyes throw gazes to the east!
My heart doth charge the watch; the morning rise
Doth cite each moving sense from idle rest.
Not daring trust the office of mine eyes,
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