| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from United States Declaration of Independence: and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns,
and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries
to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun
with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the
most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy of the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas
to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of
their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has
United States Declaration of Independence |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Walden by Henry David Thoreau: favor, to get custom, by how many modes, only not state-prison
offenses; lying, flattering, voting, contracting yourselves into a
nutshell of civility or dilating into an atmosphere of thin and
vaporous generosity, that you may persuade your neighbor to let you
make his shoes, or his hat, or his coat, or his carriage, or import
his groceries for him; making yourselves sick, that you may lay up
something against a sick day, something to be tucked away in an old
chest, or in a stocking behind the plastering, or, more safely, in
the brick bank; no matter where, no matter how much or how little.
I sometimes wonder that we can be so frivolous, I may almost
say, as to attend to the gross but somewhat foreign form of
Walden |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Before Adam by Jack London: gritting her teeth, making frightful grimaces,
snarling, uttering sharp and continuous cries that
sounded like "kh-ah! kh-ah!" So sudden and formidable
was her appearance that the boar involuntarily bunched
himself together on the defensive and bristled as she
swerved toward him. Then she swerved toward me. She
had quite taken the breath out of him. I knew just
what to do in that moment of time she had gained. I
leaped to meet her, catching her about the waist and
holding on hand and foot--yes, by my feet; I could hold
on by them as readily as by my hands. I could feel in
|
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 A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare: I euermore did loue you Hermia,
Did euer keepe your counsels, neuer wronged you,
Saue that in loue vnto Demetrius,
I told him of your stealth vnto this wood.
He followed you, for loue I followed him,
But he hath chid me hence, and threatned me
To strike me, spurne me, nay to kill me too;
And now, so you will let me quiet go,
To Athens will I beare my folly backe,
And follow you no further. Let me go.
You see how simple, and how fond I am
A Midsummer Night's Dream |
