| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Options by O. Henry: course, that I love you, and that I have been in that idiotic state
for a long time. I don't want any more foolish
ness about it--that is, I mean I want an answer from you right now.
Will you marry me or not? Hold the wire, please. Keep out, Central.
Hello, hello! Will you, or will you not.?"
That was just the uppercut for Reddy Burns' chin. The answer came
back:
"Why, Phil, dear, of course I will! I didn't know that you--that is,
you never said--oh, come up to the house, please--I can't say what I
want to over the 'phone. You are so importunate. But please come up
to the house, won't you?"
Options |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Alcibiades I by Plato: our own good and evil?
ALCIBIADES: How can we, Socrates?
SOCRATES: You mean, that if you did not know Alcibiades, there would be no
possibility of your knowing that what belonged to Alcibiades was really
his?
ALCIBIADES: It would be quite impossible.
SOCRATES: Nor should we know that we were the persons to whom anything
belonged, if we did not know ourselves?
ALCIBIADES: How could we?
SOCRATES: And if we did not know our own belongings, neither should we
know the belongings of our belongings?
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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 An Unsocial Socialist by George Bernard Shaw: nodded and walked away, leaving the other staring after him.
"If he has jilted her, he is a scoundrel," said Erskine. "I am
sorry I didn't tell him so."
He mounted and rode slowly along the Riverside Road, partly
suspecting Trefusis of some mystification, but inclining to
believe in him, and, in any case, to take his advice as to
Gertrude. The conversation he had overheard in the avenue still
perplexed him. He could not reconcile it with Trefusis's
profession of disinterestedness towards her.
His bicycle carried him noiselessly on its india-rubber tires to
the place by which the hemlock grew and there he saw Gertrude
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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 Desert Gold by Zane Grey: --that of his mother. Gale shook off the tender memories. This
desolate wilderness with its forbidding silence and its dark
promise of hell on the morrow--this was not the place to unnerve
oneself with thoughts of love and home. But the torturing paradox
of the thing was that this was just the place and just the night
for a man to be haunted.
By and by Gale rose and walked down a shadowy aisle
between the mesquites. On his way back the Yaqui joined him.
Gale was not surprised. He had become used to the Indian's
strange guardianship. But now, perhaps because of Gale's poignancy
of thought, the contending tides of love and regret, the deep,
Desert Gold |
