| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Dreams by Olive Schreiner: up again they were two twinkling stars, that vanished in the distance.
And the long, long night rolled on.
All who leave the valley of superstition pass through that dark land; but
some go through it in a few days, some linger there for months, some for
years, and some die there.
At last for the hunter a faint light played along the horizon, and he rose
to follow it; and he reached that light at last, and stepped into the broad
sunshine. Then before him rose the almighty mountains of Dry-facts and
Realities. The clear sunshine played on them, and the tops were lost in
the clouds. At the foot many paths ran up. An exultant cry burst from the
hunter. He chose the straightest and began to climb; and the rocks and
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Little Women by Louisa May Alcott: for her resources were small, and when her sisters left her to amuse
herself, she soon found that accomplished and important little self
a great burden. She didn't like dolls, fairy tales were childish,
and one couldn't draw all the time. Tea parties didn't amount to
much neither did picnics unless very well conducted. "If one could
have a fine house, full of nice girls, or go traveling, the summer
would be delightful, but to stay at home with three selfish sisters
and a grown-up boy was enough to try the patience of a Boaz,"
complained Miss Malaprop, after several days devoted to pleasure,
fretting, and ennui.
No one would own that they were tired of the experiment, but
Little Women |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen: talking of nothing more dreadful than a new publication
which is shortly to come out, in three duodecimo volumes,
two hundred and seventy-six pages in each, with a frontispiece
to the first, of two tombstones and a lantern--do you
understand? And you, Miss Morland--my stupid sister has
mistaken all your clearest expressions. You talked
of expected horrors in London--and instead of instantly
conceiving, as any rational creature would have done,
that such words could relate only to a circulating library,
she immediately pictured to herself a mob of three thousand
men assembling in St. George's Fields, the Bank attacked,
Northanger Abbey |
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 Unseen World and Other Essays by John Fiske: despairingly from one deserted village to another in a vain
search for food, or a resting-place in which to hide themselves
from the rain. The epidemics incident to the season were thus
spread over the whole country; and, until the close of the year,
disease continued so prevalent as to form a subject of
communication from the government in Bengal to the Court of
Directors. Millions of famished wretches died in the struggle to
live through the few intervening weeks that separated them from
the harvest, their last gaze being probably fixed on the
densely-covered fields that would ripen only a little too late
for them..... Three months later, another bountiful harvest, the
The Unseen World and Other Essays |
