| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Shakespeare's Sonnets by William Shakespeare: And dig deep trenches in thy beauty's field,
Thy youth's proud livery so gazed on now,
Will be a tatter'd weed of small worth held:
Then being asked, where all thy beauty lies,
Where all the treasure of thy lusty days;
To say, within thine own deep sunken eyes,
Were an all-eating shame, and thriftless praise.
How much more praise deserv'd thy beauty's use,
If thou couldst answer 'This fair child of mine
Shall sum my count, and make my old excuse,'
Proving his beauty by succession thine!
|
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: openly. He had a terror of Earnshaw's reputation, and shrunk from
encountering him; and yet he was always received with our best
attempts at civility: the master himself avoided offending him,
knowing why he came; and if he could not be gracious, kept out of
the way. I rather think his appearance there was distasteful to
Catherine; she was not artful, never played the coquette, and had
evidently an objection to her two friends meeting at all; for when
Heathcliff expressed contempt of Linton in his presence, she could
not half coincide, as she did in his absence; and when Linton
evinced disgust and antipathy to Heathcliff, she dared not treat
his sentiments with indifference, as if depreciation of her
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 Crowd by Gustave le Bon: point of fact from our investigation of the psychology of crowds.
On this account I shall proceed to set them forth.
No doubt the weak side of universal suffrage is too obvious to be
overlooked. It cannot be gainsaid that civilisation has been the
work of a small minority of superior intelligences constituting
the culminating point of a pyramid, whose stages, widening in
proportion to the decrease of mental power, represent the masses
of a nation. The greatness of a civilisation cannot assuredly
depend upon the votes given by inferior elements boasting solely
numerical strength. Doubtless, too, the votes recorded by crowds
are often very dangerous. They have already cost us several
|
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 Figure in the Carpet by Henry James: "Good!" I exclaimed. "I'll make it sure - I'll send him the same."
CHAPTER VII.
MY words however were not absolutely the same - I put something
instead of "angel"; and in the sequel my epithet seemed the more
apt, for when eventually we heard from our traveller it was merely,
it was thoroughly to be tantalised. He was magnificent in his
triumph, he described his discovery as stupendous; but his ecstasy
only obscured it - there were to be no particulars till he should
have submitted his conception to the supreme authority. He had
thrown up his commission, he had thrown up his book, he had thrown
up everything but the instant need to hurry to Rapallo, on the
|
