| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Idylls of the King by Alfred Tennyson: Full many a holy vow and pure resolve.
These, as but born of sickness, could not live:
For when the blood ran lustier in him again,
Full often the bright image of one face,
Making a treacherous quiet in his heart,
Dispersed his resolution like a cloud.
Then if the maiden, while that ghostly grace
Beamed on his fancy, spoke, he answered not,
Or short and coldly, and she knew right well
What the rough sickness meant, but what this meant
She knew not, and the sorrow dimmed her sight,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Muse of the Department by Honore de Balzac: marry, the carriages to be sold, exchanges greetings, and is away
again; and is so far from amusing, that it cannot bear itself for more
than the few days known as 'the season.' "
"Hence," said Lousteau, hoping to stop this nimble tongue by an
epigram, "in Perfidious Albion, as the /Constitutionnel/ has it, you
may happen to meet a charming woman in any part of the kingdom."
"But charming /English/ women!" replied Madame de la Baudraye with a
smile. "Here is my mother, I will introduce you," said she, seeing
Madame Piedefer coming towards them.
Having introduced the two Paris lions to the ambitious skeleton that
called itself woman under the name of Madame Piedefer--a tall, lean
The Muse of the Department |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Call of the Canyon by Zane Grey: With the coming of twilight a cold, keen wind moaned through the cedars.
Carley would have hovered close to the fire even if she had not been too
tired to exert herself. Despite her aches, she did justice to the supper.
It amazed her that appetite consumed her to the extent of overcoming a
distaste for this strong, coarse cooking. Before the meal ended darkness
had fallen, a windy raw darkness that enveloped heavily like a blanket.
Presently Carley edged closer to the fire, and there she stayed,
alternately turning back and front to the welcome heat. She seemingly
roasted hands, face, and knees while her back froze. The wind blew the
smoke in all directions. When she groped around with blurred, smarting eyes
to escape the hot smoke, it followed her. The other members of the party
The Call of the Canyon |
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 Lesser Hippias by Plato: was probably due to their definite form, and to their inimitable
excellence. The three dialogues which we have offered in the Appendix to
the criticism of the reader may be partly spurious and partly genuine; they
may be altogether spurious;--that is an alternative which must be frankly
admitted. Nor can we maintain of some other dialogues, such as the
Parmenides, and the Sophist, and Politicus, that no considerable objection
can be urged against them, though greatly overbalanced by the weight
(chiefly) of internal evidence in their favour. Nor, on the other hand,
can we exclude a bare possibility that some dialogues which are usually
rejected, such as the Greater Hippias and the Cleitophon, may be genuine.
The nature and object of these semi-Platonic writings require more careful
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