| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Snow Image by Nathaniel Hawthorne: playthings or a man of mighty faculties and little aims, whose
life, with all its high performances, was vague and empty,
because no high purpose had endowed it with reality.
Still, Ernest's neighbor was thrusting his elbow into his side,
and pressing him for an answer.
"Confess! confess! Is not he the very picture of your Old Man of
the Mountain?"
"No!" said Ernest bluntly, "I see little or no likeness."
"Then so much the worse for the Great Stone Face!" answered his
neighbor; and again he set up a shout for Old Stony Phiz.
But Ernest turned away, melancholy, and almost despondent: for
The Snow Image |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Essays & Lectures by Oscar Wilde: barbarous habit of exogamy, the ancient writers saw only the
deliberate commemoration of an historical event.
Aristotle does not tell us by what method he discovered that the
Greeks used to buy their wives in primitive times, but, judging by
his general principles, it was probably through some legend or myth
on the subject which lasted to his own day, and not, as we would
do, by arguing back from the marriage presents given to the bride
and her relatives. (4)
The origin of the common proverb 'worth so many beeves,' in which
we discern the unconscious survival of a purely pastoral state of
society before the use of metals was known, is ascribed by Plutarch
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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 King James Bible: feet.
PSA 47:4 He shall choose our inheritance for us, the excellency of
Jacob whom he loved. Selah.
PSA 47:5 God is gone up with a shout, the LORD with the sound of a
trumpet.
PSA 47:6 Sing praises to God, sing praises: sing praises unto our King,
sing praises.
PSA 47:7 For God is the King of all the earth: sing ye praises with
understanding.
PSA 47:8 God reigneth over the heathen: God sitteth upon the throne of
his holiness.
King James Bible |
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 American by Henry James: He had seen and done a great deal, enjoyed and observed
a great deal; he felt older, and yet he felt younger too.
He remembered Mr. Babcock and his desire to form conclusions,
and he remembered also that he had profited very little by his
friend's exhortation to cultivate the same respectable habit.
Could he not scrape together a few conclusions? Baden-Baden was
the prettiest place he had seen yet, and orchestral music in
the evening, under the stars, was decidedly a great institution.
This was one of his conclusions! But he went on to reflect
that he had done very wisely to pull up stakes and come abroad;
this seeing of the world was a very interesting thing.
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