| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane: ears from hearing the first words of the new
battle.
Of a sudden the guns on the slope roared out
a message of warning. A spluttering sound had
begun in the woods. It swelled with amazing
speed to a profound clamor that involved the
earth in noises. The splitting crashes swept
along the lines until an interminable roar was
developed. To those in the midst of it it became
a din fitted to the universe. It was the whirring
and thumping of gigantic machinery, complica-
The Red Badge of Courage |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Exiles by Honore de Balzac: At that period, great and small, priests and laymen, all trembled
before the idea of any supernatural power. The word "magic" was as
powerful as leprosy to root up feelings, break social ties, and freeze
piety in the most generous soul. It suddenly struck the constable's
wife that she had never, in fact, seen either of her lodgers
exercising any human function. Though the younger man's voice was as
sweet and melodious as the tones of a flute, she so rarely heard it
that she was tempted to think his silence the result of a spell. As
she recalled the strange beauty of that pink-and-white face, and saw
in memory the fine hair and moist brilliancy of those eyes, she
believed that they were indeed the artifices of the Devil. She
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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 A Sentimental Journey by Laurence Sterne: months after.
It seems he usually took his stand near the iron gates which lead
up to the palace, and as his croix had caught the eyes of numbers,
numbers had made the same enquiry which I had done. - He had told
them the same story, and always with so much modesty and good
sense, that it had reach'd at last the king's ears; - who, hearing
the Chevalier had been a gallant officer, and respected by the
whole regiment as a man of honour and integrity, - he broke up his
little trade by a pension of fifteen hundred livres a year.
As I have told this to please the reader, I beg he will allow me to
relate another, out of its order, to please myself: - the two
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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 House of Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne: her eyes from the page to Clifford's face, Phoebe would be made
aware, by the light breaking through it, that a more delicate
intelligence than her own had caught a lambent flame from what
she read. One glow of this kind, however, was often the
precursor of gloom for many hours afterward; because, when the
glow left him, he seemed conscious of a missing sense and
power, and groped about for them, as if a blind man should go
seeking his lost eyesight.
It pleased him more, and was better for his inward welfare, that
Phoebe should talk, and make passing occurrences vivid to his
mind by her accompanying description and remarks. The life of
House of Seven Gables |
