| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from King Henry VI by William Shakespeare: Cropp'd are the flower-de-luces in your arms;
Of England's coat one half is cut away.
EXETER.
Were our tears wanting to this funeral,
These tidings would call forth their flowing tides.
BEDFORD.
Me they concern; Regent I am of France.
Give me my steeled coat. I'll fight for France.
Away with these disgraceful wailing robes!
Wounds will I lend the French instead of eyes,
To weep their intermissive miseries.
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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 Kreutzer Sonata by Leo Tolstoy: present fashions in evening dress may be cited. I am of opinion
that this is not right.
The truth is, that the whole affair has been exalted by poets and
romancers to an undue importance, and that love in its various
developments is not a fitting object to consume the best energies
of men. People set it before them and strive after it, because
their view of life is as vulgar and brutish as is that other
conception frequently met with in the lower stages of
development, which sees in luscious and abundant food an end
worthy of man's best efforts. Now, this is not right and should
not be done. And, in order to avoid doing it, it is only needful
The Kreutzer Sonata |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from St. Ives by Robert Louis Stevenson: eaves by the rising of the ground. About the walls of the garden
there went a line of well-grown elms and beeches, the first
entirely bare, the last still pretty well covered with red leaves,
and the centre was occupied with a thicket of laurel and holly, in
which I could see arches cut and paths winding.
I was now within hail of my friends, and not much the better. The
house appeared asleep; yet if I attempted to wake any one, I had no
guarantee it might not prove either the aunt with the gold
eyeglasses (whom I could only remember with trembling), or some ass
of a servant-maid who should burst out screaming at sight of me.
Higher up I could hear and see a shepherd shouting to his dogs and
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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 Poems of William Blake by William Blake: And says; Thou mother of my children, I have loved thee
And I have given thee a crown that none can take away.
But how this is sweet maid, I know not, and I cannot know
I ponder, and I cannot ponder; yet I live and love.
The daughter of beauty wip'd her pitying tears with her white veil,
And said, Alas! I knew not this, and therefore did I weep:
That God would love a Worm I knew, and punish the evil foot
That wilful bruis'd its helpless form: but that he cherish'd it
With milk and oil I never knew, and therefore did I weep,
And I complaind in the mild air, because I fade away.
And lay me down in thy cold bed, and leave my shining lot.
Poems of William Blake |
