| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Bucky O'Connor by William MacLeod Raine: "It's not all you'll get. Do you think I'm a cheap piker? No,
sir. You've got to let me grub-stake you." Mackenzie thumped a
clinched fist down on the table.
"All right, seh. You're the doctor. Give me an interest in that
map and I'll prospect the mine this summer, if I can locate it."
"Good enough, and I'll finance the proposition. You and Dave can
take half-shares in the property. In the meantime, are you open
to an engagement?"
"Depends what it is," replied Bucky cautiously.
"My foreman's quit on me. Gone into business for himself. I'm
looking for a good man. Will you be my major-domo?"
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe: proposed, therefore, to the governor Spaniard that he should go to
them, with Friday's father, and propose to them to remove, and
either plant for themselves, or be taken into their several
families as servants to be maintained for their labour, but without
being absolute slaves; for I would not permit them to make them
slaves by force, by any means; because they had their liberty given
them by capitulation, as it were articles of surrender, which they
ought not to break.
They most willingly embraced the proposal, and came all very
cheerfully along with him: so we allotted them land and
plantations, which three or four accepted of, but all the rest
Robinson Crusoe |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Emma by Jane Austen: to be good behaviour to his father.
"I have made a most wretched discovery," said he, after a short pause.--
"I have been here a week to-morrow--half my time. I never knew
days fly so fast. A week to-morrow!--And I have hardly begun to
enjoy myself. But just got acquainted with Mrs. Weston, and others!--
I hate the recollection."
"Perhaps you may now begin to regret that you spent one whole day,
out of so few, in having your hair cut."
"No," said he, smiling, "that is no subject of regret at all.
I have no pleasure in seeing my friends, unless I can believe myself
fit to be seen."
Emma |
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 Breaking Point by Mary Roberts Rinehart: stood for, and a woman. And the woman was not Elizabeth.
He cursed himself in the dark for a fool and a madman; he cursed
the infatuation which rose like a demoniac possession from his
early life. When that failed he tried to kill it by remembering
the passage of time, the loathing she must have nursed all these
years. He summoned the image of Elizabeth to his aid, to find it
eclipsed by something infinitely more real and vital. Beverly in
her dressing-room, grotesque and yet lovely in her make-up; Beverly
on the mountain-trail, in her boyish riding clothes. Beverly.
Probably at that stage of his recovery his mind had reacted more
quickly than his emotions. And by that strange faculty by which
The Breaking Point |
