| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Chronicles of the Canongate by Walter Scott: and suspended upon two posts, with as much wood and iron about it
as would have builded a brig; and there it hung, creaking,
groaning, and screaming in every blast of wind, and frightening
for five miles' distance, for aught I know, the nests of thrushes
and linnets, the ancient denizens of the little glen.
When I entered the place I was received by Christie Steele
herself, who seemed uncertain whether to drop me in the kitchen,
or usher me into a separate apartment, as I called for tea, with
something rather more substantial than bread and butter, and
spoke of supping and sleeping, Christie at last inducted me into
the room where she herself had been sitting, probably the only
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Sophist by Plato: either of these affections. But to show that somehow and in some sense the
same is other, or the other same, or the great small, or the like unlike;
and to delight in always bringing forward such contradictions, is no real
refutation, but is clearly the new-born babe of some one who is only
beginning to approach the problem of being.
THEAETETUS: To be sure.
STRANGER: For certainly, my friend, the attempt to separate all existences
from one another is a barbarism and utterly unworthy of an educated or
philosophical mind.
THEAETETUS: Why so?
STRANGER: The attempt at universal separation is the final annihilation of
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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 Malbone: An Oldport Romance by Thomas Wentworth Higginson: This was impossible, as the house stood alone. Flushed with
excitement, she relighted the hall candles, and, taking one of
them, searched the whole entry and stairway, going down even to
the large, old-fashioned cellar.
Looking about her in this unfamiliar region, her eye fell on a
door that seemed to open into the wall; she had noticed a
similar door on the story above,--one of the closet doors that
had been nailed up by Aunt Jane's order. As she looked,
however, a chill breath blew in from another direction,
extinguishing her lamp. This air came from the outer door of
the cellar, and she had just time to withdraw into a corner
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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 Twenty Years After by Alexandre Dumas: it. How much were your animals worth, Porthos?"
"Ah, if poor Musqueton were here he could tell you to a
fraction."
"No matter; you can tell within ten crowns."
"Why, Vulcan and Bayard cost me each about two hundred
pistoles, and putting Phoebus at a hundred and fifty, we
should be pretty near the amount."
"There will remain, then, four hundred and fifty pistoles,"
said D'Artagnan, contentedly.
"Yes," said Porthos, "but there are the equipments."
"That is very true. Well, how much for the equipments?"
Twenty Years After |
