| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from House of Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne: of familiar of the house. He was an immemorial personage, who
seemed always to have had a white head and wrinkles, and never
to have possessed but a single tooth, and that a half-decayed one,
in the front of the upper jaw. Well advanced as Hepzibah was,
she could not remember when Uncle Venner, as the neighborhood
called him, had not gone up and down the street, stooping a
little and drawing his feet heavily over the gravel or pavement.
But still there was something tough and vigorous about him,
that not only kept him in daily breath, but enabled him to fill
a place which would else have been vacant in the apparently
crowded world. To go of errands with his slow and shuffling gait,
House of Seven Gables |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from On the Duty of Civil Disobedience by Henry David Thoreau: experienced a little in his own person. Cast your whole
vote, not a strip of paper merely, but your whole influence.
A minority is powerless while it conforms to the majority;
it is not even a minority then; but it is irresistible when
it clogs by its whole weight. If the alternative is to keep
all just men in prison, or give up war and slavery, the
State will not hesitate which to choose. If a thousand men
were not to pay their tax bills this year, that would not be
a violent and bloody measure, as it would be to pay them,
and enable the State to commit violence and shed innocent
blood. This is, in fact, the definition of a peaceable
On the Duty of Civil Disobedience |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Kreutzer Sonata by Leo Tolstoy: Not only does she tolerate him, but she seems pleased. I even
see that she puts herself to trouble on his account. And in my
soul there rises such a hatred for her that each of her words,
each gesture, disgusts me. She notices it, she knows not what to
do, and how assume an air of indifferent animation? Ah! I
suffer! That makes her gay, she is content. And my hatred
increases tenfold, but I do not dare to give it free force,
because at the bottom of my soul I know that there are no real
reasons for it, and I remain in my seat, feigning indifference,
and exaggerating my attention and courtesy to HIM.
"Then I get angry with myself. I desire to leave the room, to
The Kreutzer Sonata |
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 Taming of the Shrew by William Shakespeare: And couple Clowder with the deep-mouth'd brach.
Saw'st thou not, boy, how Silver made it good
At the hedge-corner, in the coldest fault?
I would not lose the dog for twenty pound.
FIRST HUNTSMAN.
Why, Bellman is as good as he, my lord;
He cried upon it at the merest loss,
And twice to-day pick'd out the dullest scent;
Trust me, I take him for the better dog.
LORD.
Thou art a fool: if Echo were as fleet,
The Taming of the Shrew |
