| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving: prolonged the blue shallow of the distant mountain. A few amber
clouds floated in the sky, without a breath of air to move them.
The horizon was of a fine golden tint, changing gradually into a
pure apple green, and from that into the deep blue of the mid-
heaven. A slanting ray lingered on the woody crests of the
precipices that overhung some parts of the river, giving greater
depth to the dark gray and purple of their rocky sides. A sloop
was loitering in the distance, dropping slowly down with the
tide, her sail hanging uselessly against the mast; and as the
reflection of the sky gleamed along the still water, it seemed as
if the vessel was suspended in the air.
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Oedipus Trilogy by Sophocles: King Phoebus bids us straitly extirpate
A fell pollution that infests the land,
And no more harbor an inveterate sore.
OEDIPUS
What expiation means he? What's amiss?
CREON
Banishment, or the shedding blood for blood.
This stain of blood makes shipwreck of our state.
OEDIPUS
Whom can he mean, the miscreant thus denounced?
CREON
Oedipus Trilogy |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Island Nights' Entertainments by Robert Louis Stevenson: could scarce contain his satisfaction.
"I might have had my concertina weeks ago," thought he, "and there
is nothing needed in this world but a little courage."
Presently after he spied Lehua weeping, and was half in a mind to
tell her all was well.
"But no," thinks he; "I shall wait till I can show her the
concertina; we shall see what the chit will do then. Perhaps she
will understand in the future that her husband is a man of some
intelligence."
As soon as it was dark father and son-in-law launched Pili's boat
and set the sail. There was a great sea, and it blew strong from
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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 Glaucus/The Wonders of the Shore by Charles Kingsley: worked out, at least for England. The only attempt, I believe, in
that direction is one made by a charming book, "The Fly-fisher's
Entomology," which should be in every good angler's library; but
why should not a few fishermen combine to work out the subject for
themselves, and study for the interests both of science and their
own sport, "The Wonders of the Bank?" The work, petty as it may
seem, is much too great for one man, so prodigal is Nature of her
forms, in the stream as in the ocean; but what if a correspondence
were opened between a few fishermen - of whom one should live, say,
by the Hampshire or Berkshire chalk streams; another on the slates
and granites of Devon; another on the limestones of Yorkshire or
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