| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Tattine by Ruth Ogden [Mrs. Charles W. Ide]: children laughed till their sides ached, but after a while it ceased to be so
funny. The clouds were rolling up blacker, and there was an occasional flash
of lightning far off in the distance, but Barney stood still obdurate and
unmoved, simply revelling in the sensation of the cool water, running
down-stream against his four little donkey-legs. At last Rudolph was at his
wits' end, for what did Tattine and Mabel do but commence to cry. Great drops
of rain were falling now, and they COULD NOT BEAR THE THOUGHT of being mid-way
in that stream with the storm breaking right above their heads, and when
girls, little or big, young or old, cannot bear the thought of things they
cry. It does not always help matters; it frequently makes them more difficult,
but then again sometimes it does help a little, and this appeared to be one of
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Memoir of Fleeming Jenkin by Robert Louis Stevenson: likelihood, the beginning of that love and intimate appreciation of
things Greek, from the least to the greatest, from the AGAMEMMON
(perhaps his favourite tragedy) down to the details of Grecian
tailoring, which he used to express in his familiar phrase: 'The
Greeks were the boys.' Dr. Bell - the son of George Joseph, the
nephew of Sir Charles, and though he made less use of it than some,
a sharer in the distinguished talents of his race - had hit upon
the singular fact that certain geometrical intersections gave the
proportions of the Doric order. Fleeming, under Dr. Bell's
direction, applied the same method to the other orders, and again
found the proportions accurately given. Numbers of diagrams were
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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 Herodias by Gustave Flaubert: her eyes, declared that she would dream no more, and that she was, in
reality, perfectly happy. She reminded Antipas of their former long
delightful interviews in the atrium; their meetings at the baths;
their walks along the Sacred Way, and the sweet evening rendezvous at
the villa, among the flowery groves, listening to the murmur of
splashing fountains, within sight of the Roman Campagna. Her glances
were as tender as in former days; she drew near to him, leaned against
his breast and caressed him fondly.
But he repelled her soft advances. The love she sought to rekindle had
died long ago. He thought instead of all his misfortunes, and of the
twelve long years during which the war had continued. Protracted
Herodias |
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 Riders of the Purple Sage by Zane Grey: level with the tips of the oaks and cottonwoods below. Scattered
here and there upon this shelf were clumps of aspens, and he
walked through them into a glade that surpassed in beauty and
adaptability for a wild home, any place he had ever seen. Silver
spruces bordered the base of a precipitous wall that rose
loftily. Caves indented its surface, and there were no detached
ledges or weathered sections that might dislodge a stone. The
level ground, beyond the spruces, dropped down into a little
ravine. This was one dense line of slender aspens from which came
the low splashing of water. And the terrace, lying open to the
west, afforded unobstructed view of the valley of green treetops.
Riders of the Purple Sage |
