| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Unseen World and Other Essays by John Fiske: go straightway to the haunts of her childhood, where she might
meet once more her own friends and family?
But the account does not end here. M. Wallon, in his elaborate
history of Jeanne d'Arc, states that in 1436 the supposed Maid
visited France, and appears to have met some of the men-at-arms
with whom she had fought. In 1439 she came to Orleans, for in the
accounts of the town we read, "July 28, for ten pints of wine
presented to Jeanne des Armoises, 14 sous." And on the day of her
departure, the citizens of Orleans, by a special decree of the
town-council, presented her with 210 livres, "for the services
which she had rendered to the said city during the siege." At the
The Unseen World and Other Essays |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Eryxias by Platonic Imitator: would not any the more be richer than he.
I dare say, Eryxias, I said, that you may regard these arguments of ours as
a kind of game; you think that they have no relation to facts, but are like
the pieces in the game of draughts which the player can move in such a way
that his opponents are unable to make any countermove. (Compare Republic.)
And perhaps, too, as regards riches you are of opinion that while facts
remain the same, there are arguments, no matter whether true or false,
which enable the user of them to prove that the wisest and the richest are
one and the same, although he is in the wrong and his opponents are in the
right. There would be nothing strange in this; it would be as if two
persons were to dispute about letters, one declaring that the word Socrates
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Warlord of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs:
It could not have been more than a few seconds that I lay
senseless there upon the northern ice, while all that was
dearest to me drifted farther from my reach in the clutches of
that black fiend, for when I opened my eyes Thurid and Matai Shang
yet battled at the ladder's top, and the flier drifted but a
hundred yards farther to the south--but the end of the trailing
rope was now a good thirty feet above the ground.
Goaded to madness by the cruel misfortune that had tripped me
when success was almost within my grasp, I tore frantically across
The Warlord of Mars |
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 Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad: wilderness of poor houses, the hermitage of the perfect anarchist.
In order to reach sooner the point where he could take his omnibus,
he turned brusquely out of the populous street into a narrow and
dusky alley paved with flagstones. On one side the low brick
houses had in their dusty windows the sightless, moribund look of
incurable decay - empty shells awaiting demolition. From the other
side life had not departed wholly as yet. Facing the only gas-lamp
yawned the cavern of a second-hand furniture dealer, where, deep in
the gloom of a sort of narrow avenue winding through a bizarre
forest of wardrobes, with an undergrowth tangle of table legs, a
tall pier-glass glimmered like a pool of water in a wood. An
The Secret Agent |
