| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Little Women by Louisa May Alcott: Have you ever been there?"
"Often, years ago, but I don't mind having a look at it."
"Now tell me all about yourself. The last I heard of you,
your grandfather wrote that he expected you from Berlin."
"Yes, I spent a month there and then joined him in Paris,
where he has settled for the winter. He has friends there and
finds plenty to amuse him, so I go and come, and we got on capitally."
"That's a sociable arrangement," said Amy, missing something
in Laurie's manner, though she couldn't tell what.
"Why, you see, he hates to travel, and I hate to keep still,
so we each suit ourselves, and there is no trouble. I am often
Little Women |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from King Henry VI by William Shakespeare: Butchers and villains! bloody cannibals!
How sweet a plant have you untimely cropp'd!
You have no children, butchers! if you had,
The thought of them would have stirr'd up remorse;
But, if you ever chance to have a child,
Look in his youth to have him so cut off
As, deathsmen, you have rid this sweet young prince!
KING EDWARD.
Away with her! go, bear her hence perforce.
QUEEN MARGARET.
Nay, never bear me hence, dispatch me here;
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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 The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde: extravagant things to me. You don't know everything about me.
I think that if you did, even you would turn from me. You laugh.
Don't laugh."
"Why have you stopped playing, Dorian? Go back and give me
the nocturne over again. Look at that great, honey-coloured moon
that hangs in the dusky air. She is waiting for you to charm her,
and if you play she will come closer to the earth. You won't?
Let us go to the club, then. It has been a charming evening,
and we must end it charmingly. There is some one at White's who wants
immensely to know you--young Lord Poole, Bournemouth's eldest son.
He has already copied your neckties, and has begged me to introduce
The Picture of Dorian Gray |
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 Summer by Edith Wharton: was a small place, and developed in her a thirst for
information that her position as custodian of the
village library had previously failed to excite. For a
month or two she dipped feverishly and disconnectedly
into the dusty volumes of the Hatchard Memorial
Library; then the impression of Nettleton began to
fade, and she found it easier to take North Dormer as
the norm of the universe than to go on reading.
The sight of the stranger once more revived memories of
Nettleton, and North Dormer shrank to its real size. As
she looked up and down it, from lawyer Royall's faded
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