| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Vailima Prayers & Sabbath Morn by Robert Louis Stevenson: still to be true to what small best we can attain to. Help us in
that, our maker, the dispenser of events - Thou, of the vast
designs, in which we blindly labour, suffer us to be so far
constant to ourselves and our beloved.
FOR FRIENDS
FOR our absent loved ones we implore thy loving-kindness. Keep
them in life, keep them in growing honour; and for us, grant that
we remain worthy of their love. For Christ's sake, let not our
beloved blush for us, nor we for them. Grant us but that, and
grant us courage to endure lesser ills unshaken, and to accept
death, loss, and disappointment as it were straws upon the tide 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 The Country of the Pointed Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett: failin' has got to come to all. But Almiry's got an herb that's
good for everything." She smiled as she spoke, and looked bright
again.
"There's some herb that's good for everybody, except for them
that thinks they're sick when they ain't," announced Mrs. Todd,
with a truly professional air of finality. "Come, William, let's
have Sweet Home, an' then mother'll sing Cupid an' the Bee for us."
Then followed a most charming surprise. William mastered his
timidity and began to sing. His voice was a little faint and
frail, like the family daguerreotypes, but it was a tenor voice,
and perfectly true and sweet. I have never heard Home, Sweet Home
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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 The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson: approving conscience. But time began at last to obliterate the
freshness of my alarm; the praises of conscience began to grow
into a thing of course; I began to be tortured with throes and
longings, as of Hyde struggling after freedom; and at last, in an
hour of moral weakness, I once again compounded and swallowed the
transforming draught.
I do not suppose that, when a drunkard reasons with himself
upon his vice, he is once out of five hundred times affected by
the dangers that he runs through his brutish, physical
insensibility; neither had I, long as I had considered my
position, made enough allowance for the complete moral
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde |
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 Lock and Key Library by Julian Hawthorne, Ed.: pulling off his hat, and his attitude of accosting a good many in
his way, I saw he was asking charity; so I got a sous or two out of
my pocket, ready to give him as he took me in his turn. He passed
by me without asking anything, and yet he did not go five steps
farther before he asked charity of a little woman. I was much more
likely to have given of the two. He had scarce done with the
woman, when he pulled his hat off to another who was coming the
same way. An ancient gentleman came slowly, and after him a young
smart one. He let them both pass and asked nothing. I stood
observing him half an hour, in which time he had made a dozen turns
backward and forward, and found that he invariably pursued the same
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