| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Idylls of the King by Alfred Tennyson: But when he knew the Prince though marred with dust,
He, reverencing king's blood in a bad man,
Made such excuses as he might, and these
Full knightly without scorn; for in those days
No knight of Arthur's noblest dealt in scorn;
But, if a man were halt or hunched, in him
By those whom God had made full-limbed and tall,
Scorn was allowed as part of his defect,
And he was answered softly by the King
And all his Table. So Sir Lancelot holp
To raise the Prince, who rising twice or thrice
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from De Profundis by Oscar Wilde: longer in order to show their sympathy; or, if I desired to
entertain them, to invite them to sit down silently to bitter herbs
and funeral baked meats. I must learn how to be cheerful and
happy.
The last two occasions on which I was allowed to see my friends
here, I tried to be as cheerful as possible, and to show my
cheerfulness, in order to make them some slight return for their
trouble in coming all the way from town to see me. It is only a
slight return, I know, but it is the one, I feel certain, that
pleases them most. I saw R- for an hour on Saturday week, and I
tried to give the fullest possible expression of the delight I
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Maitre Cornelius by Honore de Balzac: personage both curious and formidable. Though quite decided through
the violence of his love to enter that house, and stay there long
enough to accomplish his design, he hesitated to take the final step,
all the while aware that he should certainly take it. But where is the
man who, in a crisis of his life, does not willingly listen to
presentiments as he hangs above the precipice? A lover worthy of being
loved, the young man feared to die before he had been received for
love's sake by the countess.
This mental deliberation was so painfully interesting that he did not
feel the cold wind as it whistled round the corner of the building,
and chilled his legs. On entering that house, he must lay aside his
|
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 Vailima Letters by Robert Louis Stevenson: Kitchener, a brother of the Colonel's. Dined in the
billiard-room, discovered we had forgot to order oatmeal;
whereupon, in the moonlit evening, I set forth in my tropical
array, mess jacket and such, to get the oatmeal, and meet a
young fellow C. - and not a bad young fellow either, only an
idiot - as drunk as Croesus. He wept with me, he wept for
me; he talked like a bad character in an impudently bad
farce; I could have laughed aloud to hear, and could make you
laugh by repeating, but laughter was not uppermost.
This morning at about seven, I set off after the lost sheep.
I could have no horse; all that could be mounted - we have
|
