| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Twilight Land by Howard Pyle: is the way he continued to reign. All day was feasting and
drinking and making merry and music and laughing and talking. But
every night at midnight the same thing happened: the lights went
out, all the people began wailing and crying, and the six tall,
terrible black men came with flashing torches and marched King
Selim away to the beautiful statue. And every night the same
voice said--"Selim! Selim! Selim! What art thou doing! To-day is
feasting and drinking and merry-making; but beware of tomorrow!"
So things went on for a twelvemonth, and at last came the end of
the year. That day and night the merry-making was merrier and
wilder and madder than it had ever been before, but the great
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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 Magic of Oz by L. Frank Baum: "How dreadful!" wailed Dorothy, wringing her hands in despair.
"You've eaten Trot and Cap'n Bill."
But just then she heard a buzzing overhead and two bees alighted on
her shoulder.
"Here we are," said a small voice in her ear. "I'm Trot, Dorothy."
"And I'm Cap'n Bill," said the other bee.
Dorothy almost fainted, with relief, and the Wizard, who was close by
and had heard the tiny voices, gave a laugh and said:
"You are not the only two bees in the forest, it seems, but I advise
you to keep away from the Lion and the Tiger until you regain your
proper forms."
The Magic 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 Duchesse de Langeais by Honore de Balzac: functions, all of them, however, existing for one common end.
Such social dissonances are so inevitably the outcome of any
charter of the constitution, that however much a Liberal may be
disposed to complain of them, as of treason against those sublime
ideas with which the ambitious plebeian is apt to cover his
designs, he would none the less think it a preposterous notion
that M. le Prince de Montmorency, for instance, should continue
to live in the Rue Saint-Martin at the corner of the street which
bears that nobleman's name; or that M. le Duc de Fitz-James,
descendant of the royal house of Scotland, should have his hotel
at the angle of the Rue Marie Stuart and the Rue Montorgueil.
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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 The Ancient Regime by Charles Kingsley: their class, only served to split it up more and more; and when the
Revolution broke them up, once and for all, with all other
privileges whatsoever, no bond of union was left; and each man stood
alone, proud of his "individuality"--his complete social isolation;
till he discovered that, in ridding himself of superiors, he had rid
himself also of fellows; fulfilling, every man in his own person,
the old fable of the bundle of sticks; and had to submit, under the
Consulate and the Empire, to a tyranny to which the Ancien Regime
was freedom itself.
For, in France at least, the Ancien Regime was no tyranny. The
middle and upper classes had individual liberty--it may be, only too
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