| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Voyage to Abyssinia by Father Lobo: Whimsical touches arise out of this strength of character and
readiness of resource, as when he tells of the taste of the
Abyssinians for raw cow's flesh, with a sauce high in royal
Abyssinian favour, made of the cow's gall and contents of its
entrails, of which, when he was pressed to partake, he could only
excuse himself and his brethren by suggesting that it was too good
for such humble missionaries. Out of distinguished respect for it,
they refrained from putting it into their mouths.
Good Father Lobo gave up the desire of his heart, when it was proved
unattainable, and returned to India six years after the breaking up
of his work in Abyssinia, at the age of forty-seven. He came to be
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Rescue by Joseph Conrad: Lingard cared for nothing on earth but for his brig--and in his
thoughts he would smilingly correct the statement by adding that
he cared for nothing LIVING but the brig.
To him she was as full of life as the great world. He felt her
live in every motion, in every roll, in every sway of her
tapering masts, of those masts whose painted trucks move forever,
to a seaman's eye, against the clouds or against the stars. To
him she was always precious--like old love; always
desirable--like a strange woman; always tender--like a mother;
always faithful --like the favourite daughter of a man's heart.
For hours he would stand elbow on rail, his head in his hand and
The Rescue |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from 1984 by George Orwell: gazing at his empty glass, and hardly noticed when his feet carried him out
into the street again. Within twenty years at the most, he reflected, the
huge and simple question, 'Was life better before the Revolution than it
is now?' would have ceased once and for all to be answerable. But in effect
it was unanswerable even now, since the few scattered survivors from the
ancient world were incapable of comparing one age with another. They
remembered a million useless things, a quarrel with a workmate, a hunt for
a lost bicycle pump, the expression on a long-dead sister's face, the
swirls of dust on a windy morning seventy years ago: but all the relevant
facts were outside the range of their vision. They were like the ant,
which can see small objects but not large ones. And when memory failed and
1984 |
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 Dracula by Bram Stoker: at this day. He have follow the wake of the berserker Icelander,
the devil-begotten Hun, the Slav, the Saxon, the Magyar.
"So far, then, we have all we may act upon, and let me
tell you that very much of the beliefs are justified
by what we have seen in our own so unhappy experience.
The vampire live on, and cannot die by mere passing of the time,
he can flourish when that he can fatten on the blood of the living.
Even more, we have seen amongst us that he can even grow younger,
that his vital faculties grow strenuous, and seem as though
they refresh themselves when his special pabulum is plenty.
"But he cannot flourish without this diet, he eat not as others.
Dracula |
