| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Jolly Corner by Henry James: failing to bring any one to the door, I lingered in my despair on
the steps. After a little, if she hadn't come, by such a mercy, I
should have found means to hunt her up. But it wasn't," said Alice
Staverton, as if once more with her fine intentions - "it wasn't
only that."
His eyes, as he lay, turned back to her. "What more then?"
She met it, the wonder she had stirred. "In the cold dim dawn, you
say? Well, in the cold dim dawn of this morning I too saw you."
"Saw ME - ?"
"Saw HIM," said Alice Staverton. "It must have been at the same
moment."
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Herland by Charlotte Gilman: There you have it. You see, they were Mothers, not in our
sense of helpless involuntary fecundity, forced to fill and overfill
the land, every land, and then see their children suffer, sin, and
die, fighting horribly with one another; but in the sense of Conscious
Makers of People. Mother-love with them was not a brute passion,
a mere "instinct," a wholly personal feeling; it was--a religion.
It included that limitless feeling of sisterhood, that wide
unity in service, which was so difficult for us to grasp. And
it was National, Racial, Human--oh, I don't know how to say it.
We are used to seeing what we call "a mother" completely
wrapped up in her own pink bundle of fascinating babyhood,
Herland |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde: that we try to develop when things of high import make us afraid,
or when we are stirred by some new emotion for which we
cannot find expression, or when some thought that terrifies
us lays sudden siege to the brain and calls on us to yield.
After a time the bee flew away. He saw it creeping into the stained
trumpet of a Tyrian convolvulus. The flower seemed to quiver,
and then swayed gently to and fro.
Suddenly the painter appeared at the door of the studio and made staccato
signs for them to come in. They turned to each other and smiled.
"I am waiting," he cried. "Do come in. The light is quite perfect,
and you can bring your drinks."
The Picture of Dorian Gray |
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 Hero of Our Time by M.Y. Lermontov: inwardly congratulated Grushnitski from my
heart.
"She is an extremely pretty girl," I said. "She
has such velvet eyes -- yes, velvet is the word. I
should advise you to appropriate the expression
when speaking of her eyes. The lower and upper
lashes are so long that the sunbeams are not
reflected in her pupils. I love those eyes without
a glitter, they are so soft that they appear to
caress you. However, her eyes seem to be her
only good feature. . . Tell me, are her teeth
|
