| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Persuasion by Jane Austen: assistance, cordials, restoratives were supplied by her husband
to all who needed them.
Louisa had once opened her eyes, but soon closed them again,
without apparent consciousness. This had been a proof of life,
however, of service to her sister; and Henrietta, though perfectly
incapable of being in the same room with Louisa, was kept,
by the agitation of hope and fear, from a return of her own insensibility.
Mary, too, was growing calmer.
The surgeon was with them almost before it had seemed possible.
They were sick with horror, while he examined; but he was not hopeless.
The head had received a severe contusion, but he had seen greater injuries
Persuasion |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from An Episode Under the Terror by Honore de Balzac: "My post is here where the sufferers are," the priest said simply, and
the women said no more, but looked at their guest in reverent
admiration. He turned to the nun with the wafers.
"Sister Marthe," he said, "the messenger will say Fiat Voluntas in
answer to the word Hosanna."
"There is some one on the stairs!" cried the other nun, opening a
hiding-place contrived in the roof.
This time it was easy to hear, amid the deepest silence, a sound
echoing up the staircase; it was a man's tread on the steps covered
with dried lumps of mud. With some difficulty the priest slipped into
a kind of cupboard, and the nun flung some clothes over him.
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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 The House of Dust by Conrad Aiken: Up high black walls, up sombre terraces,
Clinging like luminous birds to the sides of cliffs,
The yellow lights went climbing towards the sky.
From high black walls, gleaming vaguely with rain,
Each yellow light looked down like a golden eye.
They trembled from coign to coign, and tower to tower,
Along high terraces quicker than dream they flew.
And some of them steadily glowed, and some soon vanished,
And some strange shadows threw.
And behind them all the ghosts of thoughts went moving,
Restlessly moving in each lamplit room,
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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 Falk by Joseph Conrad: himself for a fellow that went about courting and
upsetting girls' heads, while he knew all the time
that no decent housewifely girl could think of mar-
rying him. At least he (Hermann) could not con-
ceive how any girl could. Fancy Lena! . . . No,
it was impossible. The thoughts that would come
into their heads every time they sat down to a meal.
Horrible! Horrible!
"You are too squeamish, Hermann," I said.
He seemed to think it was eminently proper to be
squeamish if the word meant disgust at Falk's con-
Falk |
