| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe: but the latter was inevitable death; no cure, no hell), could be
possible, nothing could follow but death. And it was worse also to
others, because, as above, it secretly and unperceived by others or by
themselves, communicated death to those they conversed with, the
penetrating poison insinuating itself into their blood in a manner
which it is impossible to describe, or indeed conceive.
This infecting and being infected without so much as its being
known to either person is evident from two sorts of cases which
frequently happened at that time; and there is hardly anybody living
who was in London during the infection but must have known several
of the cases of both sorts.
A Journal of the Plague Year |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy: and the crowd walked about and jostled each other, and every now and then
a man got upon a platform and sang a comic song.
The spirit of Sue seemed to hover round him and prevent his
flirting and drinking with the frolicsome girls who made advances--
wistful to gain a little joy. At ten o'clock he came away,
choosing a circuitous route homeward to pass the gates of
the college whose head had just sent him the note.
The gates were shut, and, by an impulse, he took from his pocket
the lump of chalk which as a workman he usually carried there,
and wrote along the wall:
"I HAVE UNDERSTANDING AS WELL AS YOU; I AM NOT INFERIOR TO YOU:
Jude the Obscure |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Essays & Lectures by Oscar Wilde: Polybius from Timaeus show that the latter historian fully deserved
the punning name given to him. But in Polybius there is, I think,
little of that bitterness and pettiness of spirit which
characterises most other writers, and an incidental story he tells
of his relations with one of the historians whom he criticised
shows that he was a man of great courtesy and refinement of taste -
as, indeed, befitted one who had lived always in the society of
those who were of great and noble birth.
Now, as regards the character of the canons by which he criticises
the works of other authors, in the majority of cases he employs
simply his own geographical and military knowledge, showing, for
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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 Hiero by Xenophon: [2] Or, "for fear of machinations." But the word is suggestive of
mechanical inventions also, like those of Archimedes in connection
with a later Hiero (see Plut. "Marcel." xv. foll.); or of
Lionardo, or of Michael Angelo (Symonds, "Renaissance in Italy,"
"The Fine Arts," pp. 315, 393).
And when he has secretly and silently made away with all such people
through terror, whom has he to fall back upon to be of use to him,
save only the unjust, the incontinent, and the slavish-natured?[3] Of
these, the unjust can be trusted as sharing the tyrant's terror lest
the cities should some day win their freedom and lay strong hands upon
them; the incontinent, as satisfied with momentary license; and the
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