| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Merry Men by Robert Louis Stevenson: face like an eager sparkle of hope, but nothing of mirth.
'What are you driving at?' the dealer asked.
'Not charitable?' returned the other, gloomily. Not charitable;
not pious; not scrupulous; unloving, unbeloved; a hand to get
money, a safe to keep it. Is that all? Dear God, man, is that
all?'
'I will tell you what it is,' began the dealer, with some
sharpness, and then broke off again into a chuckle. 'But I see
this is a love match of yours, and you have been drinking the
lady's health.'
'Ah!' cried Markheim, with a strange curiosity. 'Ah, have you been
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from New Poems by Robert Louis Stevenson: The fairy bonnets them, and they
Throw their abhorred carbuncles off
And blossom like the flowers in May.
- So mankind, to angelic eyes,
So, through the scenes of life below,
In life's ironical disguise,
A travesty of man, ye go:
But fear not: ere the curtain fall,
Death in the transformation scene
Steps forward from her pedestal,
Apparent, as the fairy Queen;
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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 Tales of Unrest by Joseph Conrad: lunatics. Incidentally he reflected that the fellow dead there had
been a noxious beast anyway; that men died every day in thousands;
perhaps in hundreds of thousands--who could tell?--and that in the
number, that one death could not possibly make any difference;
couldn't have any importance, at least to a thinking creature. He,
Kayerts, was a thinking creature. He had been all his life, till that
moment, a believer in a lot of nonsense like the rest of mankind--who
are fools; but now he thought! He knew! He was at peace; he was
familiar with the highest wisdom! Then he tried to imagine himself
dead, and Carlier sitting in his chair watching him; and his attempt
met with such unexpected success, that in a very few moments he became
Tales of Unrest |
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 Odyssey by Homer: Then thy mother asked the gods for glorious prizes in the
games, and set them in the midst of the lists for the
champions of the Achaeans. In days past thou hast been at
the funeral games of many a hero, whenso, after some king's
death, the young men gird themselves and make them ready
for the meed of victory; but couldst thou have seen these
gifts thou wouldst most have marvelled in spirit, such
glorious prizes did the goddess set there to honour thee,
even Thetis, the silver-footed; for very dear wert thou to
the gods. Thus not even in death hast thou lost thy name,
but to thee shall be a fair renown for ever among all men,
The Odyssey |
