| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Europeans by Henry James: But she had not positively declined to undertake Clifford's
higher education, and Felix, who had not thought of the matter
again, being haunted with visions of more personal profit,
now reflected that the work of redemption had fairly begun.
The idea in prospect had seemed of the happiest, but in operation
it made him a trifle uneasy. "What if Eugenia--what if Eugenia"--
he asked himself softly; the question dying away in his sense of
Eugenia's undetermined capacity. But before Felix had time either
to accept or to reject its admonition, even in this vague form,
he saw Robert Acton turn out of Mr. Wentworth's inclosure,
by a distant gate, and come toward the cottage in the orchard.
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Mosses From An Old Manse by Nathaniel Hawthorne: returned merrily after midnight. I would fain be friends with you
for their sake."
"If it be as thou sayest," replied Goodman Brown, "I marvel they
never spoke of these matters; or, verily, I marvel not, seeing
that the least rumor of the sort would have driven them from New
England. We are a people of prayer, and good works to boot, and
abide no such wickedness."
"Wickedness or not," said the traveller with the twisted staff,
"I have a very general acquaintance here in New England. The
deacons of many a church have drunk the communion wine with me;
the selectmen of divers towns make me their chairman; and a
Mosses From An Old Manse |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Madam How and Lady Why by Charles Kingsley: so narrow that there was no room for anything at the bottom of it,
save a torrent roaring between walls of polished rock. High above
the torrent the road was cut out among the cliffs, and above the
road rose more cliffs, with great black cavern mouths, hundreds of
feet above our heads, out of each of which poured in foaming
waterfalls streams large enough to turn a mill, and above them
mountains piled on mountains, all covered with woods of box, which
smelt rich and hot and musky in the warm spring air. Among the
box-trees and fallen boulders grew hepaticas, blue and white and
red, such as you see in the garden; and little stars of gentian,
more azure than the azure sky. But out of the box-woods above
|
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 Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson: his credit. It is now ten; I must go home and read these
documents in quiet; but I shall be back before midnight, when we
shall send for the police."
They went out, locking the door of the theatre behind them;
and Utterson, once more leaving the servants gathered about the
fire in the hall, trudged back to his office to read the two
narratives in which this mystery was now to be explained.
Dr. Lanyon's Narrative
On the ninth of January, now four days ago, I received by the
evening delivery a registered envelope, addressed in the hand of
my colleague and old school companion, Henry Jekyll. I was a good
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde |
