| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Passionate Pilgrim by William Shakespeare: Thy grace being gain'd cures all disgrace in me.
My vow was breath, and breath a vapour is;
Then, thou fair sun, that on this earth doth shine,
Exhale this vapour vow; in thee it is:
If broken, then it is no fault of mine.
If by me broke, what fool is not so wise
To break an oath, to win a paradise?
IV.
Sweet Cytherea, sitting by a brook
With young Adonis, lovely, fresh, and green,
Did court the lad with many a lovely look,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Memoir of Fleeming Jenkin by Robert Louis Stevenson: him.' I showed him radiantly how it was the world we must know,
the world as it was, not a world expurgated and prettified with
optimistic rainbows. 'Yes, yes,' said he; 'but this badness is
such an easy, lazy explanation. Won't you be tempted to use it,
instead of trying to understand people?'
In the year 1878, he took a passionate fancy for the phonograph:
it was a toy after his heart, a toy that touched the skirts of
life, art, and science, a toy prolific of problems and theories.
Something fell to be done for a University Cricket Ground Bazaar.
'And the thought struck him,' Mr. Ewing writes to me, 'to exhibit
Edison's phonograph, then the very newest scientific marvel. The
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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 Alexander's Bridge by Willa Cather: but, dear me, we do need some one."
Just then they drove up to the Duke of York's,
so Alexander did not commit himself,
but followed Mainhall into the theatre.
When they entered the stage-box on the left the
first act was well under way, the scene being
the interior of a cabin in the south of Ireland.
As they sat down, a burst of applause drew
Alexander's attention to the stage. Miss
Burgoyne and her donkey were thrusting their
heads in at the half door. "After all,"
Alexander's Bridge |
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 Lover's Complaint by William Shakespeare: Like usury applying wet to wet,
Or monarchs' hands, that lets not bounty fall
Where want cries 'some,' but where excess begs all.
Of folded schedules had she many a one,
Which she perus'd, sigh'd, tore, and gave the flood;
Crack'd many a ring of posied gold and bone,
Bidding them find their sepulchres in mud;
Found yet mo letters sadly penn'd in blood,
With sleided silk feat and affectedly
Enswath'd, and seal'd to curious secrecy.
These often bath'd she in her fluxive eyes,
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