| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Bronte Sisters: had got it, he condescended to cast a glance over my picture.
Being a man of taste, he had something to say on this subject as
well as another, and having modestly commented on it, without much
encouragement from me, he proceeded to expatiate on the art in
general. Receiving no encouragement in that either, he dropped it,
but did not depart.
'You don't give us much of your company, Mrs. Huntingdon,' observed
he, after a brief pause, during which I went on coolly mixing and
tempering my colours; 'and I cannot wonder at it, for you must be
heartily sick of us all. I myself am so thoroughly ashamed of my
companions, and so weary of their irrational conversation and
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Lysis by Plato: too young to love, or even hating their father or mother when they are
punished by them, are never dearer to them than at the time when they are
being hated by them.
I think that what you say is true.
And, if so, not the lover, but the beloved, is the friend or dear one?
Yes.
And the hated one, and not the hater, is the enemy?
Clearly.
Then many men are loved by their enemies, and hated by their friends, and
are the friends of their enemies, and the enemies of their friends. Yet
how absurd, my dear friend, or indeed impossible is this paradox of a man
Lysis |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Princess by Alfred Tennyson: The smouldering homestead, and the household flower
Torn from the lintel--all the common wrong--
A smoke go up through which I loom to her
Three times a monster: now she lightens scorn
At him that mars her plan, but then would hate
(And every voice she talked with ratify it,
And every face she looked on justify it)
The general foe. More soluble is this knot,
By gentleness than war. I want her love.
What were I nigher this although we dashed
Your cities into shards with catapults,
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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 Vailima Letters by Robert Louis Stevenson: announced by a humorous orator, who convulsed the audience,
introducing singing notes, now on the name of the article,
now on the number; six thousand odd heads of taro, three
hundred and nineteen cooked pigs; and one thing that
particularly caught me (by good luck), a single turtle 'for
the King' - LE TASI MO LE TUPU. Then came one of the
strangest sights I have yet witnessed. The two most
important persons there (bar Mataafa) were Popo and his son.
They rose, holding their long shod rods of talking men,
passed forth from the house, broke into a strange dance, the
father capering with outstretched arms and rod, the son
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