| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Poems by Oscar Wilde: Who from Mount Ida saw the little cloud
Pass over Tenedos and lofty Troy
And knew the coming of the Queen, and bowed
In wonder at her feet, not for the sake
Of a new Helen would I bid her hand the apple take.
Then rise supreme Athena argent-limbed!
And, if my lips be musicless, inspire
At least my life: was not thy glory hymned
By One who gave to thee his sword and lyre
Like AEschylos at well-fought Marathon,
And died to show that Milton's England still could bear a son!
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Kenilworth by Walter Scott: entered as he spoke, "for I will lay my life he is another man
when he wakes than he has been these thirty days past."
"Ay, Will," said the curate, "hast thou then so much confidence
in Doctor Diddleum's draught?"
"Not a whit," said Will, "because master ne'er tasted a drop
on't, seeing it was emptied out by the housemaid. But here's a
gentleman, who came attending on Master Tressilian, has given Sir
Hugh a draught that is worth twenty of yon un. I have spoken
cunningly with him, and a better farrier or one who hath a more
just notion of horse and dog ailment I have never seen; and such
a one would never be unjust to a Christian man."
Kenilworth |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Man against the Sky by Edwin Arlington Robinson: With much already learned, and more to learn,
And more to follow. Lord! how I see him now,
Pretending, maybe trying, to be like us.
Whatever he may have meant, we never had him;
He failed us, or escaped, or what you will, --
And there was that about him (God knows what, --
We'd flayed another had he tried it on us)
That made as many of us as had wits
More fond of all his easy distances
Than one another's noise and clap-your-shoulder.
But think you not, my friend, he'd never talk!
|
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 Blue Flower by Henry van Dyke: the hour of the evening meal had come; the inmates of the
cloister were assembled in the refectory.
On the dais sat the stately Abbess Addula, daughter of
King Dagobert, looking a princess indeed, in her purple tunic,
with the hood and cuffs of her long white robe trimmed with
ermine, and a snowy veil resting like a crown on her silver
hair. At her right hand was the honoured guest, and at her
left hand her grandson, the young Prince Gregor, a big, manly
boy, just returned from school.
The long, shadowy hall, with its dark-brown rafters and
beams; the double row of nuns, with their pure veils and fair
|
