| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Land of Footprints by Stewart Edward White: the bottom land. All the rest of the farm, or estate, or whatever
one would call it, is open plain, with here and there a river
bottom, or a trifle of brush cover. But never enough to constitute
more than an isolated and lonesome patch.
Before leaving London we had received from McMillan earnest
assurances that he kept open house, and that we must take
advantage of his hospitality should we happen his way. Therefore
when one of his white-robed Somalis approached us to inquire
respectfully as to what we wanted for dinner, we yielded weakly
to the temptation and told him. Then we marched us boldly to the
house and took possession.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Market-Place by Harold Frederic: house and made it our home, and so on,--why, you won't
even come and look at the house!"
"But I don't want to see it," the mother retorted; obstinately.
"Well, then, you needn't!" said Alfred, rising.
"Nobody will ask you again." "Oh yes they will,"
urged Julia, glancing meaningly from one to the other.
All her life, as it seemed, she had been accustomed to mediate
between these two unpliable and stubborn temperaments.
From her earliest childhood she had understood, somehow,
that there was a Dabney habit of mind, which was by
comparison soft and if not yielding, then politic:
The Market-Place |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Ion by Plato: speak of them by any rules of art: they are simply inspired to utter that
to which the Muse impels them, and that only; and when inspired, one of
them will make dithyrambs, another hymns of praise, another choral strains,
another epic or iambic verses--and he who is good at one is not good at any
other kind of verse: for not by art does the poet sing, but by power
divine. Had he learned by rules of art, he would have known how to speak
not of one theme only, but of all; and therefore God takes away the minds
of poets, and uses them as his ministers, as he also uses diviners and holy
prophets, in order that we who hear them may know them to be speaking not
of themselves who utter these priceless words in a state of
unconsciousness, but that God himself is the speaker, and that through them
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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 Call of the Wild by Jack London: populous kennels, or lived obscurely in the recesses of the house
after the fashion of Toots, the Japanese pug, or Ysabel, the
Mexican hairless,--strange creatures that rarely put nose out of
doors or set foot to ground. On the other hand, there were the fox
terriers, a score of them at least, who yelped fearful promises at
Toots and Ysabel looking out of the windows at them and protected
by a legion of housemaids armed with brooms and mops.
But Buck was neither house-dog nor kennel-dog. The whole realm
was his. He plunged into the swimming tank or went hunting with
the Judge's sons; he escorted Mollie and Alice, the Judge's
daughters, on long twilight or early morning rambles; on wintry
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