| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Moon-Face and Other Stories by Jack London: gentle buffets life had dealt them. He passed amusedly over the black-eyed,
frail-bodied Mrs. Grantly, and halted on the fourth person, a portly,
massive-headed man, whose gray temples belied the youthful solidity of his
face.
"Who's that?" Chris whispered.
"A Mr. Barton. The train was late. That's why you didn't see him at dinner.
He's only a capitalist--water-power-long-distance-electricity-transmitter, or
something like that."
"Doesn't look as though he could give an ox points on imagination."
"He can't. He inherited his money. But he knows enough to hold on to it and
hire other men's brains. He is very conservative."
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte: Earnshaw was what might have been expected; it followed fast on his
sister's: there were scarcely six months between them. We, at the
Grange, never got a very succinct account of his state preceding
it; all that I did learn was on occasion of going to aid in the
preparations for the funeral. Mr. Kenneth came to announce the
event to my master.
'Well, Nelly,' said he, riding into the yard one morning, too early
not to alarm me with an instant presentiment of bad news, 'it's
yours and my turn to go into mourning at present. Who's given us
the slip now, do you think?'
'Who?' I asked in a flurry.
Wuthering Heights |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Door in the Wall, et. al. by H. G. Wells: its iron core, which somehow set part of the ironwork humming. The
place made the visitor's head reel with the throb, throb, throb of
the engines, the rotation of the big wheels, the spinning
ball-valves, the occasional spittings of the steam, and over all
the deep, unceasing, surging note of the big dynamo. This last
noise was from an engineering point of view a defect, but Azuma-zi
accounted it unto the monster for mightiness and pride.
If it were possible we would have the noises of that shed
always about the reader as he reads, we would tell all our story to
such an accompaniment. It was a steady stream of din, from which
the ear picked out first one thread and then another; there was the
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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 The United States Constitution: President of the United States; If he approve he shall sign it,
but if not he shall return it, with his Objections to that House
in which it shall have originated, who shall enter the Objections
at large on their Journal, and proceed to reconsider it.
If after such Reconsideration two thirds of that house
shall agree to pass the Bill, it shall be sent,
together with the Objections, to the other House, by which
it shall likewise be reconsidered, and if approved by two thirds
of that House, it shall become a law. But in all such Cases
the Votes of both Houses shall be determined by Yeas and Nays,
and the Names of the Persons voting for and against the Bill shall be
The United States Constitution |
