| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Confessio Amantis by John Gower: For who that takth be Robberie
His love, he mai noght justefie
His cause, and so fulofte sithe
For ones that he hath be blithe 6140
He schal ben after sory thries.
Ensample of suche Robberies
I finde write, as thou schalt hiere,
Acordende unto this matiere.
I rede hou whilom was a Maide,
The faireste, as Ovide saide,
Which was in hire time tho;
Confessio Amantis |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Jungle Tales of Tarzan by Edgar Rice Burroughs: roar that a figure appeared in the doorway of the hut.
It was the figure of the wailer whom he had come to still,
the figure of a young woman with a wooden skewer
through the split septum of her nose, with a heavy
metal ornament depending from her lower lip, which it
had dragged down to hideous and repulsive deformity,
with strange tattooing upon forehead, cheeks, and breasts,
and a wonderful coiffure built up with mud and wire.
A sudden flare of the fire threw the grotesque figure
into high relief, and Tarzan recognized her as Momaya,
the mother of Tibo. The fire also threw out a fitful
The Jungle Tales of Tarzan |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Taras Bulba and Other Tales by Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol: off his gaberdine and lay down upon the floor without a thought of
begging for mercy. He too thirsted for action; but, at the same time,
his soul was accessible to other sentiments. The need of love burned
ardently within him. When he had passed his eighteenth year, woman
began to present herself more frequently in his dreams; listening to
philosophical discussions, he still beheld her, fresh, black-eyed,
tender; before him constantly flitted her elastic bosom, her soft,
bare arms; the very gown which clung about her youthful yet
well-rounded limbs breathed into his visions a certain inexpressible
sensuousness. He carefully concealed this impulse of his passionate
young soul from his comrades, because in that age it was held shameful
Taras Bulba and Other Tales |
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 Mirror of the Sea by Joseph Conrad: towed her away from the cold edge of the world into a harbour with
docks and workshops, where, with many blows of hammers, her
pulsating heart of steel was set going again to go forth presently
in the renewed pride of its strength, fed on fire and water,
breathing black smoke into the air, pulsating, throbbing,
shouldering its arrogant way against the great rollers in blind
disdain of winds and sea.
The track she had made when drifting while her heart stood still
within her iron ribs looked like a tangled thread on the white
paper of the chart. It was shown to me by a friend, her second
officer. In that surprising tangle there were words in minute
The Mirror of the Sea |
