| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx: reformers of every imaginable kind. This form of Socialism has,
moreover, been worked out into complete systems.
We may site Proudhon's Philosophie de la Misere as an example of
this form.
The Socialistic bourgeois want all the advantages of modern
social conditions without the struggles and dangers necessarily
resulting therefrom. They desire the existing state of society
minus its revolutionary and disintegrating elements. They wish
for a bourgeoisie without a proletariat. The bourgeoisie
naturally conceives the world in which it is supreme to be the
best; and bourgeois Socialism develops this comfortable
The Communist Manifesto |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Madame Firmiani by Honore de Balzac: his books and took care of the house; the mother was always ill. The
daughters are charming girls, but they have been cruelly taught that
the world thinks little of beauty without money. What a scene it was!
I entered their house the accomplice in a crime; I left it an honest
man, who had purged his father's memory. Uncle, I don't judge him;
there is such excitement, such passion in a lawsuit that even an
honorable man may be led astray by them. Lawyers can make the most
unjust claims legal; laws have convenient syllogisms to quiet
consciences. My visit was a drama. To BE Providence itself; actually
to fulfil that futile wish, 'If heaven were to send us twenty thousand
francs a year,'--that silly wish we all make, laughing; to bring
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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 Emerald City of Oz by L. Frank Baum: both see me again before the day comes when you must leave this farm."
"The day isn't far away, now," her uncle sadly replied. "I did not
tell you of our trouble until I was obliged to, dear Dorothy, so the
evil time is near at hand. But if you are quite sure your fairy
friends will give you a home, it will be best for you to go to them,
as your aunt says."
That was why Dorothy went to her little room in the attic that
afternoon, taking with her a small dog named Toto. The dog had curly
black hair and big brown eyes and loved Dorothy very dearly.
The child had kissed her uncle and aunt affectionately before she went
upstairs, and now she looked around her little room rather wistfully,
The Emerald City of Oz |
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 'Twixt Land & Sea by Joseph Conrad: him in silence. Two billiard-players, with cues in their hands,
had come to the door of the billiard-room and stared, too.
On Gomez coming up to him, Jasper raised one hand to point at his
own throat. Gomez noted the somewhat soiled state of his white
clothes, then took one look at his face, and fled away to order the
drink for which Jasper seemed to be asking.
Where he wanted to go - or what purpose - where he, perhaps, only
imagined himself to be going, when a sudden impulse or the sight of
a familiar place had made him turn into Orange House - it is
impossible to say. He was steadying himself lightly with the tips
of his fingers on the little table. There were on that verandah
'Twixt Land & Sea |
