| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Muse of the Department by Honore de Balzac: that she had done wrong in writing; she vowed never to write another
line, and she kept her vow.
Then was there desolation in the Sancerrois.
"Why did not Madame de la Baudraye compose any more verses?" was the
universal cry.
At this time Madame de la Baudraye had no enemies; every one rushed to
see her, not a week passed without fresh introductions. The wife of
the presiding judge, an august /bourgeoise/, /nee/ Popinot-Chandier,
desired her son, a youth of two-and-twenty, to pay his humble respects
to La Baudraye, and flattered herself that she might see her Gatien in
the good graces of this Superior Woman.--The words Superior Woman had
The Muse of the Department |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Dawn O'Hara, The Girl Who Laughed by Edna Ferber: and this is October. Get out and walk until your cheeks
are so red that Von Gerhard will refuse to believe that
this fiery-faced puffing, bouncing creature is the green
and limp thing that huddled in a chair a few months ago.
Out ye go!"
And out I went. Hatless, I strode countrywards,
leaving paved streets and concrete walks far behind.
There were drifts of fallen leaves all about, and I
scuffled through them drearily, trying to feel gloomy,
and old, and useless, and failing because of the tang in
the air, and the red-and-gold wonder of the frost-kissed
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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 A Drama on the Seashore by Honore de Balzac: asked her if she felt the courage to face the burning sun and the
strength to walk through sand.
"I have boots," she said. "Let us go," and she pointed to the tower of
Batz, which arrested the eye by its immense pile placed there like a
pyramid; but a slender, delicately outlined pyramid, a pyramid so
poetically ornate that the imagination figured in it the earliest ruin
of a great Asiatic city.
We advanced a few steps and sat down upon the portion of a large rock
which was still in the shade. But it was now eleven o'clock, and the
shadow, which ceased at our feet, was disappearing rapidly.
"How beautiful this silence!" she said to me; "and how the depth of it
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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 On Horsemanship by Xenophon: rather than the circular; for the horse, being already sated with the
straight course, will be all the more ready to turn, and will be
practised at once in the straight course and in wheeling. At the
curve, he should be held up,[19] because it is neither easy nor indeed
safe when the horse is at full speed to turn sharp, especially if the
ground is broken[20] or slippery.
[17] {pede}, figure of eight.
[18] Or, "on first one and then the other half of the manege."
[19] {upolambanein}. See "Hipparch," iii. 14; "Hunting," iii. 10; vi.
22, of a dog.
[20] {apokroton}, al. {epikroton}, "beaten, hard-trodden ground."
On Horsemanship |
