| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Animal Farm by George Orwell: Napoleon decreed that there should be a full investigation into Snowball's
activities. With his dogs in attendance he set out and made a careful tour
of inspection of the farm buildings, the other animals following at a
respectful distance. At every few steps Napoleon stopped and snuffed the
ground for traces of Snowball's footsteps, which, he said, he could detect
by the smell. He snuffed in every corner, in the barn, in the cow-shed,
in the henhouses, in the vegetable garden, and found traces of Snowball
almost everywhere. He would put his snout to the ground, give several deep
sniffs, ad exclaim in a terrible voice, "Snowball! He has been here! I can
smell him distinctly!" and at the word "Snowball" all the dogs let out
blood-curdling growls and showed their side teeth.
Animal Farm |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Betty Zane by Zane Grey: tall and very fair for an Indian. But I have something to tell about her more
interesting than that. Since I have been with the Wyandots this last time I
have discovered a little of the jealously guarded secret of Myeerah's mother.
When Tarhe and his band of Hurons lived in Canada their home was in the
Muskoka Lakes region on the Moon river. The old warriors tell wonderful
stories of the beauty of that country. Tarhe took captive some French
travellers, among them a woman named La Durante. She had a beautiful little
girl. The prisoners, except this little girl, were released. When she grew up
Tarhe married her. Myeerah is her child. Once Tarhe took his wife to Detroit
and she was seen there by an old Frenchman who went crazy over her and said
she was his child. Tarhe never went to the white settlements again. So you
Betty Zane |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Mirror of the Sea by Joseph Conrad: and the great West Wind silence is the safest sort of diplomacy.
Moreover, I knew my skipper. He did not want to know what I
thought. Shipmasters hanging on a breath before the thrones of the
winds ruling the seas have their psychology, whose workings are as
important to the ship and those on board of her as the changing
moods of the weather. The man, as a matter of fact, under no
circumstances, ever cared a brass farthing for what I or anybody
else in his ship thought. He had had just about enough of it, I
guessed, and what he was at really was a process of fishing for a
suggestion. It was the pride of his life that he had never wasted
a chance, no matter how boisterous, threatening, and dangerous, of
The Mirror of the Sea |
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 Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin: of mine, and one of the members also of that society, who wrote me
word that it had been read, but was laughed at by the connoisseurs.
The papers, however, being shown to Dr. Fothergill, he thought them
of too much value to be stifled, and advis'd the printing of them.
Mr. Collinson then gave them to Cave for publication in his
Gentleman's Magazine; but he chose to print them separately in
a pamphlet, and Dr. Fothergill wrote the preface. Cave, it seems,
judged rightly for his profit, for by the additions that arrived
afterward they swell'd to a quarto volume, which has had five editions,
and cost him nothing for copy-money.
It was, however, some time before those papers were much taken notice
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin |
