| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Father Damien by Robert Louis Stevenson: Many have visited the station before me; they seem not to have
heard the rumour. When I was there I heard many shocking tales,
for my informants were men speaking with the plainness of the
laity; and I heard plenty of complaints of Damien. Why was this
never mentioned? and how came it to you in the retirement of your
clerical parlour?
But I must not even seem to deceive you. This scandal, when I read
it in your letter, was not new to me. I had heard it once before;
and I must tell you how. There came to Samoa a man from Honolulu;
he, in a public-house on the beach, volunteered the statement that
Damien had "contracted the disease from having connection with the
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions by Edwin A. Abbot: my two voices I reveal my shape to my Wives, who are at this moment
six thousand miles seventy yards two feet eight inches away, the one
to the North, the other to the South. Listen, I call to them."
He chirruped, and then complacently continued: "My wives at this
moment receiving the sound of one of my voices, closely followed by
the other, and perceiving that the latter reaches them after
an interval in which sound can traverse 6.457 inches, infer that one
of my mouths is 6.457 inches further from them than the other,
and accordingly know my shape to be 6.457 inches. But you will
of course understand that my wives do not make this calculation
every time they hear my two voices. They made it, once for all,
Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen: Longbourn had by some accident been lost.
"My aunt," she continued, "is going to-morrow into that part of
the town, and I shall take the opportunity of calling in Grosvenor
Street."
She wrote again when the visit was paid, and she had seen Miss
Bingley. "I did not think Caroline in spirits," were her words,
"but she was very glad to see me, and reproached me for giving
her no notice of my coming to London. I was right, therefore,
my last letter had never reached her. I inquired after their
brother, of course. He was well, but so much engaged with Mr.
Darcy that they scarcely ever saw him. I found that Miss Darcy
Pride and Prejudice |
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 Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas: on individuals -- a physiological study. I have believed it
was much easier to descend from the whole to a part than to
ascend from a part to the whole. It is an algebraic axiom,
which makes us proceed from a known to an unknown quantity,
and not from an unknown to a known; but sit down, sir, I beg
of you."
Monte Cristo pointed to a chair, which the procureur was
obliged to take the trouble to move forwards himself, while
the count merely fell back into his own, on which he had
been kneeling when M. Villefort entered. Thus the count was
halfway turned towards his visitor, having his back towards
The Count of Monte Cristo |
