| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Seraphita by Honore de Balzac: Divine substance.
They stood in the twilight of the Coming Dawn, whose feeble rays
prepared them to look upon the True Light, to hear the Living Word,
and yet not die.
In this state they began to perceive the immeasurable differences
which separate the things of earth from the things of Heaven.
LIFE, on the borders of which they stood, leaning upon each other,
trembling and illuminated, like two children standing under shelter in
presence of a conflagration, That Life offered no lodgment to the
senses.
The ideas they used to interpret their vision to themselves were to
Seraphita |
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 A Hero of Our Time by M.Y. Lermontov: involuntarily, I ask myself: 'why have I lived --
for what purpose was I born?' . . . A purpose
there must have been, and, surely, mine was an
exalted destiny, because I feel that within my
soul are powers immeasurable. . . But I was
not able to discover that destiny, I allowed myself
to be carried away by the allurements of passions,
inane and ignoble. From their crucible I issued
hard and cold as iron, but gone for ever was the
glow of noble aspirations -- the fairest flower of
life. And, from that time forth, how often have
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