| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy: leaned back his big head with its broad temples and close-cropped
hair, and looked at Bezukhov. The stern, shrewd, and penetrating
expression of that look struck Pierre. He felt a wish to speak to
the stranger, but by the time he had made up his mind to ask him a
question about the roads, the traveler had closed his eyes. His
shriveled old hands were folded and on the finger of one of them
Pierre noticed a large cast iron ring with a seal representing a
death's head. The stranger sat without stirring, either resting or, as
it seemed to Pierre, sunk in profound and calm meditation. His servant
was also a yellow, wrinkled old man, without beard or mustache,
evidently not because he was shaven but because they had never
War and Peace |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Happy Prince and Other Tales by Oscar Wilde: Rose-tree, and set her breast against the thorn. All night long
she sang with her breast against the thorn, and the cold crystal
Moon leaned down and listened. All night long she sang, and the
thorn went deeper and deeper into her breast, and her life-blood
ebbed away from her.
She sang first of the birth of love in the heart of a boy and a
girl. And on the top-most spray of the Rose-tree there blossomed a
marvellous rose, petal following petal, as song followed song.
Pale was it, at first, as the mist that hangs over the river - pale
as the feet of the morning, and silver as the wings of the dawn.
As the shadow of a rose in a mirror of silver, as the shadow of a
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Flame and Shadow by Sara Teasdale: If you have forgotten their wet, sleepy fragrance,
Then you can return and not be afraid.
But if you remember, then turn away forever
To the plains and the prairies where pools are far apart,
There you will not come at dusk on closing water lilies,
And the shadow of mountains will not fall on your heart.
"Did You Never Know?"
Did you never know, long ago, how much you loved me --
That your love would never lessen and never go?
You were young then, proud and fresh-hearted,
You were too young to know.
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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 Secret Places of the Heart by H. G. Wells: respectable people. . . . That was the world that made us
what we are. That was the sheltering and friendly greenhouse
in which we grew. We fitted our minds to that. . . . And here
we are with the greenhouse falling in upon us lump by lump,
smash and clatter, the wild winds of heaven tearing in
through the gaps."
Upstairs on Dr. Martineau's desk lay the typescript of the
opening chapters of a book that was intended to make a great
splash in the world, his PSYCHOLOGY OF A NEW AGE. He had his
metaphors ready.
"We said: 'This system will always go on. We needn't bother
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