| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Madame Firmiani by Honore de Balzac: dines at home, declares himself no longer dangerous to women, wears a
maroon coat, and has a place reserved for him in several boxes at the
"Bouffons." He is sometimes confounded with the Parasite; but he has
filled too many real functions to be thought a sponger; moreover he
possesses a small estate in a certain department, the name of which he
has never been known to utter.
"Madame Firmiani? why, my dear fellow, she was Murat's former
mistress." This man belongs to the Contradictors,--persons who note
errata in memoirs, rectify dates, correct facts, bet a hundred to one,
and are certain about everything. You can easily detect them in some
gross blunder in the course of a single evening. They will tell you
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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 Lost Princess of Oz by L. Frank Baum: agree with me that a dishpan that is yellow is unnatural. What shall
we do with this one, which we have just found?"
"Let us carry it back to the Emerald City," suggested the Scarecrow.
"Some of our friends might like to have it for a foot-bath, and in
using it that way, its golden color and sparkling ornaments would not
injure its usefulness."
So they went away and took the jeweled dishpan with them. And after
wandering through the country for a day or so longer, they learned the
news that Ozma had been found. Therefore they straightway returned to
the Emerald City and presented the dishpan to Princess Ozma as a token
of their joy that she had been restored to them. Ozma promptly gave
The Lost Princess of Oz |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Call of the Canyon by Zane Grey: the divine spark, belonged to the earth. She had only been ignorant,
mindless, feelingless, absorbed in the seeking of gain, blind to the truth.
She had to give. She had been created a woman; she belonged to nature; she
was nothing save a mother of the future. She had loved neither Glenn
Kilbourne nor life itself. False education, false standards, false
environment had developed her into a woman who imagined she must feed her
body on the milk and honey of indulgence.
She was abased now--woman as animal, though saved and uplifted by her power
of immortality. Transcendental was her female power to link life with the
future. The power of the plant seed, the power of the earth, the heat of
the sun, the inscrutable creation-spirit of nature, almost the divinity of
The Call of the Canyon |
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 The Iliad by Homer: When they reached the quarters of the son of Atreus, Agamemnon
sacrificed for them a five-year-old bull in honour of Jove the
son of Saturn. They flayed the carcass, made it ready, and
divided it into joints; these they cut carefully up into smaller
pieces, putting them on the spits, roasting them sufficiently,
and then drawing them off. When they had done all this and had
prepared the feast, they ate it, and every man had his full and
equal share, so that all were satisfied, and King Agamemnon gave
Ajax some slices cut lengthways down the loin, as a mark of
special honour. As soon as they had had enough to eat and drink,
old Nestor whose counsel was ever truest began to speak; with all
The Iliad |
