| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Burning Daylight by Jack London: hammer-thrower. He put my hand down twice, the young scamp."
He turned suddenly to Dede. "Say, it's only twelve miles to
Santa Rosa, and the horses are fresh."
She divined what was in his mind, of which his twinkling eyes and
sheepish, boyish grin gave sufficient advertisement, and she
smiled and nodded acquiescence.
"We'll cut across by Bennett Valley," he said. "It's nearer that
way."
There was little difficulty, once in Santa Rosa, of finding
Slosson. He and his party had registered at the Oberlin Hotel,
and Daylight encountered the young hammer-thrower himself in the
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Reminiscences of Tolstoy by Leo Tolstoy: closer and closer, with our eyes on the white thing, it would
turn out to be not a hare at all, but a horse's skull. How
annoying!
We would look at papa and Seryózha, thinking, "I
wonder if they saw that I took that skull for a hare." But papa
would be sitting keen and alert on his English saddle, with the
wooden stirrups, smoking a cigarette, while Seryózha would
perhaps have got his leash entangled and could not get it
straight.
"Thank heaven!" we would exclaim, "nobody saw me! What a
fool I should have felt!" So we would ride on.
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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 The Tanach: Ezekiel 17: 11 Moreover the word of the LORD came unto me, saying:
Ezekiel 17: 12 'Say now to the rebellious house: Know ye not what these things mean? tell them: Behold, the king of Babylon came to Jerusalem, and took the king thereof, and the princes thereof, and brought them to him to Babylon;
Ezekiel 17: 13 and he took of the seed royal, and made a covenant with him, and brought him under an oath, and the mighty of the land he took away;
Ezekiel 17: 14 that his might be a lowly kingdom, that it might not lift itself up, but that by keeping his covenant it might stand.
Ezekiel 17: 15 But he rebelled against him in sending his ambassadors into Egypt, that they might give him horses and much people. Shall he prosper? shall he escape that doeth such things? shall he break the covenant, and yet escape?
Ezekiel 17: 16 As I live, saith the Lord GOD, surely in the place where the king dwelleth that made him king, whose oath he despised, and whose covenant he broke, even with him in the midst of Babylon he shall die.
Ezekiel 17: 17 Neither shall Pharaoh with his mighty army and great company succour him in the war, when they cast up mounds and build forts, to cut off many souls;
Ezekiel 17: 18 seeing he hath despised the oath by breaking the covenant, when, lo, he had given his hand, and hath done all these things, he shall not escape.
The Tanach |
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 Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe: hope, and bless God for it, that we were equally penitent, and
comforted, restored penitents. We had here the Word of God to
read, and no farther off from His Spirit to instruct than if we had
been in England. I always applied myself, in reading the
Scripture, to let him know, as well as I could, the meaning of what
I read; and he again, by his serious inquiries and questionings,
made me, as I said before, a much better scholar in the Scripture
knowledge than I should ever have been by my own mere private
reading. Another thing I cannot refrain from observing here also,
from experience in this retired part of my life, viz. how infinite
and inexpressible a blessing it is that the knowledge of God, and
Robinson Crusoe |
