| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from De Profundis by Oscar Wilde: full of perverse pleasures, and that unless he accepted that as a
fact about me and realised it to the full I could not possibly be
friends with him any more, or ever be in his company. It was a
terrible shock to him, but we are friends, and I have not got his
friendship on false pretences.
Emotional forces, as I say somewhere in INTENTIONS, are as limited
in extent and duration as the forces of physical energy. The
little cup that is made to hold so much can hold so much and no
more, though all the purple vats of Burgundy be filled with wine to
the brim, and the treaders stand knee-deep in the gathered grapes
of the stony vineyards of Spain. There is no error more common
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Falk by Joseph Conrad: her ravisher. Through the ragged fog of smoke
driving headlong upon the water I had a glimpse
of Falk's square motionless shoulders under a white
hat as big as a cart-wheel, of his red face, his yel-
low staring eyes, his great beard. Instead of keep-
ing a lookout ahead, he was deliberately turning his
back on the river to glare at his tow. The tall
heavy craft, never so used before in her life, seemed
to have lost her senses; she took a wild sheer against
her helm, and for a moment came straight at us,
menacing and clumsy, like a runaway mountain.
 Falk |