| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Blix by Frank Norris: manipulating it was broken up. The appropriation of a schooner in
the harbor of Callao was a story in itself; while the robbery of
thirty thousand dollars' worth of sea-otter skins from a Russian
trading-post in Alaska, accomplished chiefly through the agency of
a barrel of rum manufactured from sugar-cane, was a veritable
achievement.
He had been born, so he told them, in Winchester, in England, and--
Heaven save the mark!--had been brought up with a view of taking
orders. For some time he was a choir boy in the great Winchester
Cathedral; then, while yet a lad, had gone to sea. He had 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 The Mysterious Island by Jules Verne: Cyrus Harding and his companions climbed Prospect Heights.
What a change! The woods, which they had left green, especially in the
part at which the firs predominated, had disappeared under a uniform color.
All was white, from the summit of Mount Franklin to the shore, the forests,
the plains, the lake, the river. The waters of the Mercy flowed under a
roof of ice, which, at each rising and ebbing of the tide, broke up with
loud crashes. Numerous birds fluttered over the frozen surface of the lake.
Ducks and snipe, teal and guillemots were assembled in thousands. The rocks
among which the cascade flowed were bristling with icicles. One might have
said that the water escaped by a monstrous gargoyle, shaped with all the
imagination of an artist of the Renaissance. As to the damage caused by the
The Mysterious Island |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Theaetetus by Plato: another thing;--that, having knowledge present with him in his mind, he
should still know nothing and be ignorant of all things?--you might as well
argue that ignorance may make a man know, and blindness make him see, as
that knowledge can make him ignorant.
THEAETETUS: Perhaps, Socrates, we may have been wrong in making only forms
of knowledge our birds: whereas there ought to have been forms of
ignorance as well, flying about together in the mind, and then he who
sought to take one of them might sometimes catch a form of knowledge, and
sometimes a form of ignorance; and thus he would have a false opinion from
ignorance, but a true one from knowledge, about the same thing.
SOCRATES: I cannot help praising you, Theaetetus, and yet I must beg you
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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 Stories From the Old Attic by Robert Harris: audience with the constable. "I didn't want to say this before," he
began in a low tone, "but now I think I must, in case it should be
important. All the way into town that old fellow kept saying
something to me about wanting to cook his brains by burning a horse
biscuit under his cap."
That was enough. And, needless to say, the Authorities from the
Institution in the city were immediately summoned, and the old man
was taken to a very pleasant place where he could rest among friends
and nice people, have no worries, and be free to enjoy the
"butterflies, blue skies, and happiness always." It is reported by
reliable sources that shortly after arriving the old man was heard
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