| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Waste Land by T. S. Eliot: Out of the window perilously spread
Her drying combinations touched by the sun's last rays,
On the divan are piled (at night her bed)
Stockings, slippers, camisoles, and stays.
I Tiresias, old man with wrinkled dugs
Perceived the scene, and foretold the rest --
I too awaited the expected guest. 230
He, the young man carbuncular, arrives,
A small house agent's clerk, with one bold stare,
One of the low on whom assurance sits
As a silk hat on a Bradford millionaire.
The Waste Land |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Lysis by Plato: not indeed entirely wrong?
How so? he replied.
Have I not heard some one say, as I just now recollect, that the like is
the greatest enemy of the like, the good of the good?--Yes, and he quoted
the authority of Hesiod, who says:
'Potter quarrels with potter, bard with bard,
Beggar with beggar;'
and of all other things he affirmed, in like manner, 'That of necessity the
most like are most full of envy, strife, and hatred of one another, and the
most unlike, of friendship. For the poor man is compelled to be the friend
of the rich, and the weak requires the aid of the strong, and the sick man
Lysis |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from House of Mirth by Edith Wharton: ingenuity, spoke to him in the language just then sweetest to his
ear. It is surprising how little narrow walls and a low ceiling
matter, when the roof of the soul has suddenly been raised. Gerty
sparkled too; or at least shone with a tempered radiance. He had
never before noticed that she had "points"--really, some good
fellow might do worse . . . Over the little dinner (and here,
again, the effects were wonderful) he told her she ought to
marry--he was in a mood to pair off the whole world. She had made
the caramel custard with her own hands? It was sinful to keep
such gifts to herself. He reflected with a throb of pride that
Lily could trim her own hats--she had told him so the day of
|
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 Betty Zane by Zane Grey: to this was a certain softness of contour and a sweetness of expression which
made her face bewitching. But, in spite of that demure and innocent face, she
possessed a decided will of her own, and one very apt to be asserted; she was
mischievous; inclined to coquettishness, and more terrible than all she had a
fiery temper which could be aroused with the most surprising ease.
Colonel Zane was wont to say that his sister's accomplishments were
innumerable. After only a few months on the border she could prepare the flax
and weave a linsey dresscloth with admirable skill. Sometimes to humor Betty
the Colonel's wife would allow her to get the dinner, and she would do it in a
manner that pleased her brothers, and called forth golden praises from the
cook, old Sam's wife who had beer with the family twenty years. Betty sang in
Betty Zane |
