| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Life of the Spider by J. Henri Fabre: coolness follows upon the furnace-heat of the day, it is easy for
me, lantern in hand, to watch my neighbour's various operations.
She has taken up her abode, at a convenient height for observation,
between a row of cypress-trees and a clump of laurels, near the
entrance to an alley haunted by Moths. The spot appears well-
chosen, for the Epeira does not change it throughout the season,
though she renews her net almost every night.
Punctually as darkness falls, our whole family goes and calls upon
her. Big and little, we stand amazed at her wealth of belly and
her exuberant somersaults in the maze of quivering ropes; we admire
the faultless geometry of the net as it gradually takes shape. All
The Life of the Spider |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Where There's A Will by Mary Roberts Rinehart: cub with a body hardly big enough to carry his forefathers'
weaknesses. But he had a cold eye and a warm mouth, and that
sort of man is generally a social success and a matrimonial
failure.
It wasn't until toward night that I remembered I'd been talking
to a real prince and I hadn't once said "your Highness" or "your
Excellency" or whatever I should have said. I had said "You!"
I had hardly closed the door after them when it opened again and
Mr. Pierce came in. He shut the door and, going over to one of
the tables, put a package down on it.
"Here's the stuff you wanted for the spring, Minnie," he
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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 Edingburgh Picturesque Notes by Robert Louis Stevenson: which Rizzio's murderers made their escape and where
Queen Mary herself, according to gossip, bathed in white
wine to entertain her loveliness. Behind and overhead,
lie the Queen's Park, from Muschat's Cairn to
Dumbiedykes, St. Margaret's Loch, and the long wall of
Salisbury Crags: and thence, by knoll and rocky bulwark
and precipitous slope, the eye rises to the top of
Arthur's Seat, a hill for magnitude, a mountain in virtue
of its bold design. This upon your left. Upon the
right, the roofs and spires of the Old Town climb one
above another to where the citadel prints its broad bulk
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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 Alcibiades II by Platonic Imitator: terrors during their office, but after their return home they have been
beset by informers worse than they once were by their foes, insomuch that
several of them have wished that they had remained in a private station
rather than have had the glories of command. If, indeed, such perils and
terrors were of profit to the commonwealth, there would be reason in
undergoing them; but the very contrary is the case. Again, you will find
persons who have prayed for offspring, and when their prayers were heard,
have fallen into the greatest pains and sufferings. For some have begotten
children who were utterly bad, and have therefore passed all their days in
misery, while the parents of good children have undergone the misfortune of
losing them, and have been so little happier than the others that they
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