| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Menexenus by Plato: how the Persians, lords of Asia, were enslaving Europe, and how the
children of this land, who were our fathers, held them back. Of these I
will speak first, and praise their valour, as is meet and fitting. He who
would rightly estimate them should place himself in thought at that time,
when the whole of Asia was subject to the third king of Persia. The first
king, Cyrus, by his valour freed the Persians, who were his countrymen, and
subjected the Medes, who were their lords, and he ruled over the rest of
Asia, as far as Egypt; and after him came his son, who ruled all the
accessible part of Egypt and Libya; the third king was Darius, who extended
the land boundaries of the empire to Scythia, and with his fleet held the
sea and the islands. None presumed to be his equal; the minds of all men
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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 Breaking Point by Mary Roberts Rinehart: not get out soon, he would be too weak to travel. Exhausted and
on the verge of sunstroke, he set out on foot to find the trail.
He traveled all night, and the dawn found him still moving, a mere
automaton of a man, haggard and shambling, no longer willing his
progress, but somehow incredibly advancing. He found water and
drank it, fell, got up, and still, right foot, left foot, he went
on. Some time during that advance he had found a trail, and he
kept to it automatically. He felt no surprise and no relief when
he saw a cabin in a clearing and a woman in the doorway, watching
him with curious eyes. He pulled himself together and made a final
effort, but without much interest in the result.
The Breaking Point |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Wife, et al by Anton Chekhov: "They do, dear."
"And do you make them go down on their knees?"
"Yes, I do."
And she thought it funny that the students fought and I made them
go down on their knees, and she laughed. She was a gentle,
patient, good child. It happened not infrequently that I saw
something taken away from her, saw her punished without reason,
or her curiosity repressed; at such times a look of sadness was
mixed with the invariable expression of trustfulness on her face
-- that was all. I did not know how to take her part; only when I
saw her sad I had an inclination to draw her to me and to
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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 Before Adam by Jack London: instant and hurl me wide awake into my little bed,
where, perchance, I lie sweating and trembling and hear
the cuckoo clock calling the hour in the hall. But
this dream of my leaving home I have had many times,
and never yet have I been awakened by it. Always do I
crash, shrieking, down through the brush and fetch up
with a bump on the ground.
Scratched and bruised and whimpering, I lay where I had
fallen. Peering up through the bushes, I could see the
Chatterer. He had set up a demoniacal chant of joy and
was keeping time to it with his teetering. I quickly
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