| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Cromwell by William Shakespeare: How say you now, Hodge? is not this good fortune?
HODGE.
How say you? I'll tell you what, master Thomas; if all
men be of this Gentleman's mind, let's keep our standings
upon this Bridge: we shall get more here with begging
in one day, than I shall with making Horseshoes in a
whole year.
CROMWELL.
No Hodge, we must begone unto Bononia,
There to relieve the noble Earl of Bedford:
Where, if I fail not in my policy,
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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 Altar of the Dead by Henry James: incongruously, not indifference, but a refinement of delicacy that
had kept him from asking the sacristan, who would of course
immediately have recognised his description of her, whether she had
been seen at other hours. His delicacy had kept him from asking
any question about her at any time, and it was exactly the same
virtue that had left him so free to be decently civil to her at the
concert.
This happy advantage now served him anew, enabling him when she
finally met his eyes - it was after a fourth trial - to
predetermine quite fixedly his awaiting her retreat. He joined her
in the street as soon as she had moved, asking her if he might
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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 Songs of Innocence and Experience by William Blake: And smiled among the winter's snow,
They clothed me in the clothes of death,
And taught me to sing the notes of woe.
'And because I am happy and dance and sing,
They think they have done me no injury,
And are gone to praise God and His priest and king,
Who made up a heaven of our misery.'
NURSE'S SONG
When the voices of children are heard on the green,
And whisperings are in the dale,
The days of my youth rise fresh in my mind,
Songs of Innocence and Experience |
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 Arrow of Gold by Joseph Conrad: tones. He saw it all! He had been decoyed there! (Rattle,
rattle, rattle.) He had been decoyed into that town, he screamed,
getting more and more excited by the noise he made himself, in
order to be exposed to this! (Rattle, rattle.) By this shameless
CATIN! CATIN! CATIN!"
He started at the door again with superhuman vigour. Behind me I
heard Dona Rita laughing softly, statuesque, turned all dark in the
fading glow. I called out to her quite openly, "Do keep your self-
control." And she called back to me in a clear voice: "Oh, my
dear, will you ever consent to speak to me after all this? But
don't ask for the impossible. He was born to be laughed at."
The Arrow of Gold |
