| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Heap O' Livin' by Edgar A. Guest: good.
The trouble is mostly they're misunderstood,
My Paw said so.
You can think what you like, but I stick to it
when
My Paw said so.
An' I'll keep right on sayin', again an' again,
My Paw said so.
Maybe foxes don't talk to such people as you,
An' bears never show you the tricks they can do,
But I know that the stories I'm tellin' are true,
A Heap O' Livin' |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from La Grenadiere by Honore de Balzac: curtains. Later the curate came to pass the night in prayer with
Louis, who refused to leave his mother. On Tuesday morning an old
woman and two children and a vinedresser's wife followed the dead to
her grave. These were the only mourners. Yet this was a woman whose
wit and beauty and charm had won a European reputation, a woman whose
funeral, if it had taken place in London, would have been recorded in
pompous newspaper paragraphs, as a sort of aristocratic rite, if she
had not committed the sweetest of crimes, a crime always expiated in
this world, so that the pardoned spirit may enter heaven. Marie cried
when they threw the earth on his mother's coffin; he understood that
he should see her no more.
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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 Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas: vigorously to his horses. The two interlocutors thus separated,
taking opposite directions, at full gallop.
"Pay him, booby!" cried the stranger to his servant, without
checking the speed of his horse; and the man, after throwing two
or three silver pieces at the foot of mine host, galloped after
his master.
"Base coward! false gentleman!" cried D'Artagnan, springing
forward, in his turn, after the servant. But his wound had
rendered him too weak to support such an exertion. Scarcely had
he gone ten steps when his ears began to tingle, a faintness
seized him, a cloud of blood passed over his eyes, and he fell in
The Three Musketeers |
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 Hiero by Xenophon: eo quaereretur, 'quod acroama aut cujus vocem libentissime
audiret': 'ejus, a quo sua virtus optime praedicaretur.'"
Then Hiero: And what pleasure do you suppose mere abstinence from evil
words implies, when it is an open secret that those silent persons are
cherishing all evil thoughts against the tyrant?[24] What mirth, do
you imagine, is to be extracted from their panegyrics who are
suspected of bestowing praise out of mere flattery?
[24] "One knows plainly that these dumb attendants stand there like
mutes, but harbour every evil thought against their autocratic
lord."
Simonides made answer: Yes, I must indeed admit, I do concede to you,
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