| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Damnation of Theron Ware by Harold Frederic: and as he swallowed it down, the sinister flare of
murderous fascination died suddenly away into darkness.
The world was all black again--plunged in the Egyptian
night which lay upon the face of the deep while the earth
was yet without form and void. He was alone on it--
alone among awful, planetary solitudes which crushed him.
The sight of Celia, sitting motionless only a pace in front
of him, was plain enough to his eyes. It was an illusion.
She was really a star, many millions of miles away.
These things were hard to understand; but they were true,
none the less. People seemed to be about him, but in fact
The Damnation of Theron Ware |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Daughter of Eve by Honore de Balzac: hand of Nature. Many men, driven to marriage, prefer a girl taken from
a convent, and saturated with piety, to a girl brought up to worldly
ideas. There seems to be no middle course. A man must marry either an
educated girl, who reads the newspapers and comments upon them, who
waltzes with a dozen young men, goes to the theatre, devours novels,
cares nothing for religion, and makes her own ethics, or an ignorant
and innocent young girl, like either of the two Maries. Perhaps there
may be as much danger with the one kind as with the other. Yet the
vast majority of men who are not so old as Arnolphe, prefer a
religious Agnes to a budding Celimene.
The two Maries, who were small and slender, had the same figure, the
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Pericles by William Shakespeare: SECOND FISHERMAN.
We'll sure provide: thou shalt have my best gown to make thee a
pair; and I'll bring thee to the court myself.
PERICLES.
Then honour be but a goal to my will,
This day I'll rise, or else add ill to ill.
[Exeunt.]
SCENE II. The same. A public way, or platform leading to the
lists. A pavilion by the side of it for the reception of the
King, Princess, Lords, etc.
[Enter Simonides, Lords and Attendants.]
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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 Wrecker by Stevenson & Osbourne: would be entertained to a meal after my own soul, and contract
a Latin Quarter loan, which would keep me in tobacco and my
morning coffee for a fortnight. It might be thought the latter
would appear the more important. It might be supposed that a
life, led so near the confines of actual famine, should have
dulled the nicety of my palate. On the contrary, the poorer a
man's diet, the more sharply is he set on dainties. The last of
my ready cash, about thirty francs, was deliberately squandered
on a single dinner; and a great part of my time when I was
alone was passed upon the details of imaginary feasts.
One gleam of hope visited me--an order for a bust from a rich
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