| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Les Miserables by Victor Hugo: his effrontery persists even in the presence of grape-shot; he was
a scapegrace, he is a hero; like the little Theban, he shakes the skin
from the lion; Barra the drummer-boy was a gamin of Paris; he Shouts:
"Forward!" as the horse of Scripture says "Vah!" and in a moment he
has passed from the small brat to the giant.
This child of the puddle is also the child of the ideal.
Measure that spread of wings which reaches from Moliere to Barra.
To sum up the whole, and in one word, the gamin is a being
who amuses himself, because he is unhappy.
CHAPTER X
ECCE PARIS, ECCE HOMO
Les Miserables |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Pericles by William Shakespeare: CLEON.
Thou art like the harpy,
Which, to betray, dost, with thine angel's face,
Seize with thine eagle's talons.
DIONYZA.
You are like one that superstitiously
Doth swear to the gods that winter kills the flies:
But yet I know you'll do as I advise.
[Exeunt.]
SCENE IV.
[Enter Gower, before the monument of Marina at Tarsus.]
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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 Life in the Iron-Mills by Rebecca Davis: never made the difference between poor and rich. The Something
who looked down on him that moment through the cool gray sky had
a kindly face, he knew,--loved his children alike. Oh, he knew
that!
There were times when the soft floods of color in the crimson
and purple flames, or the clear depth of amber in the water
below the bridge, had somehow given him a glimpse of another
world than this,--of an infinite depth of beauty and of quiet
somewhere,--somewhere, a depth of quiet and rest and love.
Looking up now, it became strangely real. The sun had sunk
quite below the hills, but his last rays struck upward, touching
Life in the Iron-Mills |
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 Gettysburg Address by Abraham Lincoln: Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, given November 19, 1863
on the battlefield near Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, USA
#STARTMARK#
Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth
upon this continent a new nation: conceived in liberty, and
dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war. . .testing whether
that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated. . .
can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war.
We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting place
for those who here gave their lives that this nation might live.
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