| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Egmont by Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe: Clara, I am in a strange position. When I think how it has come to pass, I
know it, indeed, and I know it not. But I have only to look upon Egmont,
and I understand it all; ay, and stranger things would seem natural then.
Oh, what a man he is! All the provinces worship him. And in his arms,
should I not be the happiest creature in the world?
Mother. And how will it be in the future?
Clara. I only ask, does he love me?--does he love me?--as if there were
any doubt about it.
Mother. One has nothing but anxiety of heart with one's children. Always
care and sorrow, whatever may be the end of it! It cannot come to good!
Thou hast made thyself wretched! Thou hast made thy Mother wretched
Egmont |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Hidden Masterpiece by Honore de Balzac: blame you for admiring Porbus's saint. It is a masterpiece for the
world at large; only those who are behind the veil of the holy of
holies can perceive its errors. But you are worthy of a lesson, and
capable of understanding it. I will show you how little is needed to
turn that picture into a true masterpiece. Give all your eyes and all
your attention; such a chance of instruction may never fall in your
way again. Your palette, Porbus."
Porbus fetched his palette and brushes. The little old man turned up
his cuffs with convulsive haste, slipped his thumb through the palette
charged with prismatic colors, and snatched, rather than took, the
handful of brushes which Porbus held out to him. As he did so his
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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 Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe: flash of fire first, and immediately after that thunder from their
gods, had killed those two and wounded him. This, I say, is
rational; for nothing is more certain than that, as they saw no man
near them, so they had never heard a gun in all their lives, nor so
much as heard of a gun; neither knew they anything of killing and
wounding at a distance with fire and bullets: if they had, one
might reasonably believe they would not have stood so unconcerned
to view the fate of their fellows, without some apprehensions of
their own.
Our two men, as they confessed to me, were grieved to be obliged to
kill so many poor creatures, who had no notion of their danger;
Robinson Crusoe |
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 Human Drift by Jack London: was it depended upon that the Pilgrim carried only one, and that
one, going wrong at the outset, was never used again. A navigator
of the present would be aghast if asked to voyage for two years,
from Boston, around the Horn to California, and back again,
without a chronometer. In those days such a proceeding was a
matter of course, for those were the days when dead reckoning was
indeed something to reckon on, when running down the latitude was
a common way of finding a place, and when lunar observations were
direly necessary. It may be fairly asserted that very few
merchant officers of to-day ever make a lunar observation, and
that a large percentage are unable to do it.
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