| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson by Robert Louis Stevenson: consider 'the way in which I have been led.' Could a more
preposterous idea have occurred to us in those days when we used to
search our pockets for coppers, too often in vain, and combine
forces to produce the threepence necessary for two glasses of beer,
or wander down the Lothian Road without any, than that I should be
strong and well at the age of forty-three in the island of Upolu,
and that you should be at home bringing out the Edinburgh Edition?
If it had been possible, I should almost have preferred the Lothian
Road Edition, say, with a picture of the old Dutch smuggler on the
covers. I have now something heavy on my mind. I had always a
great sense of kinship with poor Robert Fergusson - so clever a
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table by Oliver Wendell Holmes: AMOUR-PROPRE is universal. When you read the story of the
Archbishop and Gil Blas, you may laugh, if you will, at the poor
old man's delusion; but don't forget that the youth was the greater
fool of the two, and that his master served such a booby rightly in
turning him out of doors.
- You need not get up a rebellion against what I say, if you find
everything in my sayings is not exactly new. You can't possibly
mistake a man who means to be honest for a literary pickpocket. I
once read an introductory lecture that looked to me too learned for
its latitude. On examination, I found all its erudition was taken
ready-made from D'Israeli. If I had been ill-natured, I should
The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from A Start in Life by Honore de Balzac: better chance of a seat to be had than in the Beaumont coaches, which
were almost always full. Pierrotin and his competitor were on the best
of terms. When the former started from Isle-Adam, the latter was
returning from Paris, and vice versa.
It is unnecessary to speak of the rival. Pierrotin possessed the
sympathies of his region; besides, he is the only one of the two who
appears in this veracious narrative. Let it suffice you to know that
the two coach proprietors lived under a good understanding, rivalled
each other loyally, and obtained customers by honorable proceedings.
In Paris they used, for economy's sake, the same yard, hotel, and
stable, the same coach-house, office, and clerk. This detail is alone
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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 Middlemarch by George Eliot: in its robust age, and his sermons were delivered without book.
People outside his parish went to hear him; and, since to fill the
church was always the most difficult part of a clergyman's function,
here was another ground for a careless sense of superiority.
Besides, he was a likable man: sweet-tempered, ready-witted, frank,
without grins of suppressed bitterness or other conversational
flavors which make half of us an affliction to our friends.
Lydgate liked him heartily, and wished for his friendship.
With this feeling uppermost, he continued to waive the question
of the chaplaincy, and to persuade himself that it was not only
no proper business of his, but likely enough never to vex him
Middlemarch |
