| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Master and Man by Leo Tolstoy: dreadful snowy waste, and could see no means of escape.
Suddenly the horse under him tumbled into something and,
sinking into a snow-drift, began to plunge and fell on his
side. Vasili Andreevich jumped off, and in so doing dragged to
one side the breechband on which his foot was resting, and
twisted round the pad to which he held as he dismounted. As
soon as he had jumped off, the horse struggled to his feet,
plunged forward, gave one leap and another, neighed again, and
dragging the drugget and the breechband after him, disappeared,
leaving Vasili Andreevich alone on the snow-drift.
The latter pressed on after the horse, but the snow lay so deep
Master and Man |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Soul of a Bishop by H. G. Wells: he do? But the church's teaching nowadays fails even to grip the
minds of boys."
The rector came to the end of his Preface: "They will evermore
endeavour themselves faithfully to observe such things as they by
their own confession have assented unto."
"Like a smart solicitor pinning them down," said the bishop to
himself, and then roused himself, unrolled the little paper in
his hand, leant forward, and straightway began his first address.
Nowadays it is possible to say very unorthodox things indeed in
an Anglican pulpit unchallenged. There remains no alert doctrinal
criticism in the church congregations. It was possible,
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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 Prince Otto by Robert Louis Stevenson: to a sense of undeserved escape. A little ruby spot of blood was
the reward of that great act of desperation; but the pain had braced
her like a tonic, and her whole design of suicide had passed away.
At the same instant regular feet drew near along the gallery, and
she knew the tread of the big Baron, so often gladly welcome, and
even now rallying her spirits like a call to battle. She concealed
the dagger in the folds of her skirt; and drawing her stature up,
she stood firm-footed, radiant with anger, waiting for the foe.
The Baron was announced, and entered. To him, Seraphina was a hated
task: like the schoolboy with his Virgil, he had neither will nor
leisure to remark her beauties; but when he now beheld her standing
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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 Riders of the Purple Sage by Zane Grey: buildin' next to Parsons's store. It's a kind of meetin'-room;
and sure enough, when we peeped in, it was half full of men.
"Venters yelled: 'Don't anybody pull guns! We ain't come for
that!' Then he tramped in, an' I was some put to keep alongside
him. There was a hard, scrapin' sound of feet, a loud cry, an'
then some whisperin', an' after that stillness you could cut with
a knife. Tull was there, an' that fat party who once tried to
throw a gun on me, an' other important-lookin' men, en' that
little frog-legged feller who was with Tull the day I rode in
here. I wish you could have seen their faces, 'specially Tull's
an' the fat party's. But there ain't no use of me tryin' to tell
Riders of the Purple Sage |
