| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from 1984 by George Orwell: ages, class distinctions had been not only inevitable but desirable.
Inequality was the price of civilization. With the development of machine
production, however, the case was altered. Even if it was still necessary
for human beings to do different kinds of work, it was no longer necessary
for them to live at different social or economic levels. Therefore, from
the point of view of the new groups who were on the point of seizing power,
human equality was no longer an ideal to be striven after, but a danger to
be averted. In more primitive ages, when a just and peaceful society was
in fact not possible, it had been fairly easy to believe it. The idea of
an earthly paradise in which men should live together in a state of
brotherhood, without laws and without brute labour, had haunted the human
1984 |
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 Herodias by Gustave Flaubert: was in very truth the Elias so much talked of, he would have power to
protect himself; and if he were only an ordinary man, his murder was
of no importance.
Mannaeus stood beside his chair, and read his master's thoughts.
Vitellius beckoned him to his side and gave him an order for the
execution, to be transmitted to the soldiers placed on guard over the
dungeon. This execution would be a relief, he thought. In a few
moments all would be over!
But for once Mannaeus did not perform a commission satisfactorily. He
left the hall but soon returned, in a state of great perturbation.
During forty years he had exercised the functions of the public
Herodias |
