| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Second Home by Honore de Balzac: contravening the social law.--But I will write to you on this subject
from Florence. A father who has the honor of presiding over a supreme
court of justice must not have to blush in the presence of his son.
Good-bye."
PARIS, February 1830-January 1842.
ADDENDUM
The following personages appear in other stories of the Human Comedy.
Beaumesnil, Mademoiselle
The Middle Classes
Scenes from a Courtesan's Life
Bianchon, Horace
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe: in me on all possible subjects, of which he and my father had no
kind of understanding, and with which they could have no possible
sympathy. But mother did; and so, when I had quarreled with Alfred,
and father looked sternly on me, I used to go off to mother's room,
and sit by her. I remember just how she used to look, with her
pale cheeks, her deep, soft, serious eyes, her white dress,--she
always wore white; and I used to think of her whenever I read in
Revelations about the saints that were arrayed in fine linen, clean
and white. She had a great deal of genius of one sort and another,
particularly in music; and she used to sit at her organ, playing
fine old majestic music of the Catholic church, and singing with
Uncle Tom's Cabin |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Bucolics by Virgil: Of battles and of kings, the Cynthian god
Plucked at mine ear and warned me: "Tityrus,
Beseems a shepherd-wight to feed fat sheep,
But sing a slender song." Now, Varus, I-
For lack there will not who would laud thy deeds,
And treat of dolorous wars- will rather tune
To the slim oaten reed my silvan lay.
I sing but as vouchsafed me; yet even this
If, if but one with ravished eyes should read,
Of thee, O Varus, shall our tamarisks
And all the woodland ring; nor can there be
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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 St. Ives by Robert Louis Stevenson: liberty and in the full possession of my spirits and resources; of
all of which I had need, because it was necessary that I should
support at the same time two opposite characters, and at once play
the cavalier and lively soldier for the eyes of Ronald, and to the
ears of Flora maintain the same profound and sentimental note that
I had already sounded. Certainly there are days when all goes well
with a man; when his wit, his digestion, his mistress are in a
conspiracy to spoil him, and even the weather smiles upon his
wishes. I will only say of myself upon that evening that I
surpassed my expectations, and was privileged to delight my hosts.
Little by little they forgot their terrors and I my caution; until
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