| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Symposium by Xenophon: have not to purchase precious viands in the market, which becomes
expensive, but I open the storehouse of my soul, and dole them
out.[63] Indeed, as far as pleasure goes, I find it better to await
desire before I suffer meat or drink to pass my lips, than to have
recourse to any of your costly viands, as, for instance, now, when I
have chanced on this fine Thasian wine,[64] and sip it without thirst.
But indeed, the man who makes frugality, not wealth of worldly goods,
his aim, is on the face of it a much more upright person. And why?--
the man who is content with what he has will least of all be prone to
clutch at what is his neighbour's.
[63] Or, "turn to the storehouse of a healthy appetite." See "Apol."
The Symposium |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Silverado Squatters by Robert Louis Stevenson: we had a fine sense of woods, and spring-time, and the open
air.
Our driver gave me a lecture by the way on Californian trees
- a thing I was much in need of, having fallen among painters
who know the name of nothing, and Mexicans who know the name
of nothing in English. He taught me the madrona, the
manzanita, the buck-eye, the maple; he showed me the crested
mountain quail; he showed me where some young redwoods were
already spiring heavenwards from the ruins of the old; for in
this district all had already perished: redwoods and
redskins, the two noblest indigenous living things, alike
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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 At the Earth's Core by Edgar Rice Burroughs: use of his right arm. My brother, Dacor the Strong One,
had gone to the land of Sari to steal a mate for himself.
Thus there was none, father, brother, or lover, to save
me from Jubal the Ugly One, and I ran away and hid among
the hills that skirt the land of Amoz. And there these
Sagoths found me and made me captive."
"What will they do with you?" I asked. "Where are they
taking us?"
Again she looked her incredulity.
"I can almost believe that you are of another world,"
she said, "for otherwise such ignorance were inexplicable.
At the Earth's Core |
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 In a German Pension by Katherine Mansfield: asking herself that silly question.
Herr Brechenmacher broke the bread into his plate, smeared it round with
his fork and chewed greedily.
"Good?" she asked, leaning her arms on the table and pillowing her breast
against them.
"But fine!"
He took a piece of the crumb, wiped it round his plate edge, and held it up
to her mouth. She shook her head.
"Not hungry," she said.
"But it is one of the best pieces, and full of the fat."
He cleared the plate; then pulled off his boots and flung them into a
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