| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy: to this training-school, after all. See how independent I shall be
after the two years' training! I shall pass pretty high, I expect,
and Mr. Phillotson will use his influence to get me a big school."
She had touched the subject at last. "I had a suspicion,
a fear," said Jude, "that he--cared about you rather warmly,
and perhaps wanted to marry you."
"Now don't be such a silly boy!"
"He has said something about it, I expect."
"If he had, what would it matter? An old man like him!"
"Oh, come, Sue; he's not so very old. And I know what I saw him doing
"Not kissing me--that I'm certain!"
Jude the Obscure |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte: shelter, for it was raining heavily.
'No, thank you, I don't mind the rain,' I said. I always lacked
common sense when taken by surprise.
'But you don't LIKE it, I suppose? - an umbrella will do you no
harm at any rate,' he replied, with a smile that showed he was not
offended; as a man of worse temper or less penetration would have
been at such a refusal of his aid. I could not deny the truth of
his assertion, and so went with him to the carriage; he even
offered me his hand on getting in: an unnecessary piece of
civility, but I accepted that too, for fear of giving offence. One
glance he gave, one little smile at parting - it was but for a
Agnes Grey |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from A Pair of Blue Eyes by Thomas Hardy: chrysanthemums, where a man is sweeping the leaves from the grass.
Stephen selects a doorway, and ascends an old though wide wooden
staircase, with moulded balusters and handrail, which in a country
manor-house would be considered a noteworthy specimen of
Renaissance workmanship. He reaches a door on the first floor,
over which is painted, in black letters, 'Mr. Henry Knight'--
'Barrister-at-law' being understood but not expressed. The wall
is thick, and there is a door at its outer and inner face. The
outer one happens to be ajar: Stephen goes to the other, and taps.
'Come in!' from distant penetralia.
First was a small anteroom, divided from the inner apartment by a
A Pair of Blue Eyes |
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 Turn of the Screw by Henry James: with a small invisible nudge, said to the other:
"She thinks she'll do it this time--but she WON'T!" To "do it"
would have been to indulge for instance--and for once in a way--
in some direct reference to the lady who had prepared them for
my discipline. They had a delightful endless appetite for passages
in my own history, to which I had again and again treated them;
they were in possession of everything that had ever happened to me,
had had, with every circumstance the story of my smallest adventures
and of those of my brothers and sisters and of the cat and the dog
at home, as well as many particulars of the eccentric nature
of my father, of the furniture and arrangement of our house,
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