| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Study of a Woman by Honore de Balzac: MISTAKE: he did not call on Madame de Listomere for several days after
the adventure, thus allowing the thoughts of that virtuous young woman
to crystallize. There were other mistakes which I will here pass over
in silence, in order to give the ladies the pleasure of deducing them,
"ex professo," to those who are unable to guess them.
Eugene at last went to call upon the marquise; but, on attempting to
pass into the house, the porter stopped him, saying that Madame la
marquise was out. As he was getting back into his carriage the Marquis
de Listomere came home.
"Come in, Eugene," he said. "My wife is at home."
Pray excuse the marquis. A husband, however good he may be, never
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Hellenica by Xenophon: but ruined by the ravages of the Thracians, precisely as he had been
told. Accordingly, having measured and found the breadth of the
isthmus barely four miles,[9] he no longer hesitated. Having offered
sacrifice, he commenced his line of wall, distributing the area to the
soldiers in detachments, and promising to award them prizes for their
industry--a first prize for the section first completed, and the rest
as each detachment of workers might deserve. By this means the whole
wall begun in spring was finished before autumn. Within these lines he
established eleven cities, with numerous harbours, abundance of good
arable land, and plenty of land under plantation, besides magnificent
grazing grounds for sheep and cattle of every kind.
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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 First Men In The Moon by H. G. Wells: rebound them, so as to give us a limited freedom of movement. Then they
unfastened the chains about our waists. To do all this they had to handle
us freely, and ever and again one of their queer heads came down close to
my face, or a soft tentacle-hand touched my head or neck. I don't remember
that I was afraid then or repelled by their proximity. I think that our
incurable anthropomorphism made us imagine there were human heads inside
their masks. The skin, like everything else, looked bluish, but that was
on account of the light; and it was hard and shiny, quite in the
beetle-wing fashion, not soft, or moist, or hairy, as a vertebrated
animal's would be. Along the crest of the head was a low ridge of whitish
spines running from back to front, and a much larger ridge curved on
The First Men In The Moon |
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 Hellenica by Xenophon: just than ourselves? Yet the people, who are poorer--have never
wronged you for the purposes of plunder; but you, whose wealth would
outweight the whole of ours, have wrought many a shameful deed for the
sake of gain. If, then, you have no monopoly of justice, can it be on
the score of courage that you are warranted to hold your heads so
high? If so, what fairer test of courage will you propose than the
arbitrament of war--the war just ended? Or do you claim superiority of
intelligence?--you, who with all your wealth of arms and walls, money
and Peloponnesian allies, have been paralysed by men who had none of
these things to aid them! Or is it on these Laconian friends of yours
that you pride yourselves? What! when these same friends have dealt by
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