| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Maria, or the Wrongs of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft: caresses then became hateful to me; his brutality was tolerable,
compared to his distasteful fondness. Still, compassion, and the
fear of insulting his supposed feelings, by a want of sympathy,
made me dissemble, and do violence to my delicacy. What a task!
"Those who support a system of what I term false refinement,
and will not allow great part of love in the female, as well as
male breast, to spring in some respects involuntarily, may not
admit that charms are as necessary to feed the passion, as virtues
to convert the mellowing spirit into friendship. To such observers
I have nothing to say, any more than to the moralists, who insist
that women ought to, and can love their husbands, because it is
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Mountains by Stewart Edward White: California's western systems. The eye followed them
up and up, and farther and farther, with the accumulating
emotion of a wild rush on a toboggan. There
came a point where the fact grew to be almost too
big for the appreciation, just as beyond a certain
point speed seems to become unbearable. It left you
breathless, wonder-stricken, awed. You could do
nothing but look, and look, and look again, tongue-
tied by the impossibility of doing justice to what you
felt. And in the far distance, finally, your soul, grown
big in a moment, came to rest on the great precipices
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from An Episode Under the Terror by Honore de Balzac: beneath which France was groaning in those days; what was more, the
old lady so far had met no one by the way. Her sight had long been
failing, so that the few foot passengers dispersed like shadows in the
distance over the wide thoroughfare through the faubourg, were quite
invisible to her by the light of the lanterns.
She had passed the end of the Rue des Morts, when she fancied that she
could hear the firm, heavy tread of a man walking behind her. Then it
seemed to her that she had heard that sound before, and dismayed by
the idea of being followed, she tried to walk faster toward a brightly
lit shop window, in the hope of verifying the suspicions which had
taken hold of her mind.
|
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 Vailima Prayers & Sabbath Morn by Robert Louis Stevenson: 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
life.
FOR THE FAMILY
AID us, if it be thy will, in our concerns. Have mercy on this
land and innocent people. Help them who this day contend in
|
