| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson: would have burst out laughing in my face. So I went up and down,
and through the street, and down to the harbour-side, like a dog
that has lost its master, with a strange gnawing in my inwards,
and every now and then a movement of despair. It grew to be high
day at last, perhaps nine in the forenoon; and I was worn with
these wanderings, and chanced to have stopped in front of a very
good house on the landward side, a house with beautiful, clear
glass windows, flowering knots upon the sills, the walls
new-harled[33] and a chase-dog sitting yawning on the step like
one that was at home. Well, I was even envying this dumb brute,
when the door fell open and there issued forth a shrewd, ruddy,
Kidnapped |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Herland by Charlotte Gilman: everlasting writhing mass of underbred people trying to get
ahead of one another--some few on top, temporarily, many constantly
crushed out underneath, a hopeless substratum of paupers
and degenerates, and no serenity or peace for anyone, no
possibility for really noble qualities among the people at large.
Neither did they start off on predatory excursions to get more
land from somebody else, or to get more food from somebody else,
to maintain their struggling mass.
Not at all. They sat down in council together and thought it
out. Very clear, strong thinkers they were. They said: "With our
best endeavors this country will support about so many people,
Herland |
| 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: And settles among the roofs, the pale grey walls.
Along damp sinuous streets it crawls,
Curls like a dream among the motionless trees
And seems to freeze.
The fog slips ghostlike into a thousand rooms,
Whirls over sleeping faces,
Spins in an atomy dance round misty street lamps;
And blows in cloudy waves over open spaces . . .
And one from his high window, looking down,
Peers at the cloud-white town,
And thinks its island towers are like a dream . . .
|
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 Chouans by Honore de Balzac: more.
Mademoiselle de Verneuil was thoughtful. Perhaps her imagination led
her over a greater extent of the future than that of the young
/emigre/, who was merely following one of the many impulses of his
life as a man; whereas Marie was considering a lifetime, thinking to
make it beautiful, and to fill it with happiness and with grand and
noble sentiments. Happy in such thoughts, more in love with her ideal
than with the actual reality, with the future rather than with the
present, she desired now to return upon her steps so as to better
establish her power. In this she acted instinctively, as all women
act. Having agreed with her soul that she would give herself wholly
The Chouans |
