| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Story of an African Farm by Olive Schreiner: break one daily, to see the white spot wax into the chicken. We are not
excited or enthusiastic about it; but a man is not to lay his throat open,
he must think of something. So we plant seeds in rows on our dam-wall, and
pull one up daily to see how it goes with them. Alladeen buried her
wonderful stone, and a golden palace sprung up at her feet. We do far
more. We put a brown seed in the earth, and a living thing starts out--
starts upward--why, no more than Alladeen can we say--starts upward, and
does not desist till it is higher than our heads, sparkling with dew in the
early morning, glittering with yellow blossoms, shaking brown seeds with
little embryo souls on to the ground. We look at it solemnly, from the
time it consists of two leaves peeping above the ground and a soft white
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Silas Marner by George Eliot: reach, which had delighted in making him a second time desolate? He
shrank from this vaguer dread, and fixed his mind with struggling
effort on the robber with hands, who could be reached by hands. His
thoughts glanced at all the neighbours who had made any remarks, or
asked any questions which he might now regard as a ground of
suspicion. There was Jem Rodney, a known poacher, and otherwise
disreputable: he had often met Marner in his journeys across the
fields, and had said something jestingly about the weaver's money;
nay, he had once irritated Marner, by lingering at the fire when he
called to light his pipe, instead of going about his business. Jem
Rodney was the man--there was ease in the thought. Jem could be
Silas Marner |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Maggie: A Girl of the Streets by Stephen Crane: with a chivalrous air, as if rescuing a human being from an
oncoming express train.
As the girl passed down through the hall, she went before open
doors framing more eyes strangely microscopic, and sending broad
beams of inquisitive light into the darkness of her path. On the
second floor she met the gnarled old woman who possessed the music box.
"So," she cried, "'ere yehs are back again, are yehs? An'
dey've kicked yehs out? Well, come in an' stay wid me teh-night.
I ain' got no moral standin'."
From above came an unceasing babble of tongues, over all of
which rang the mother's derisive laughter.
Maggie: A Girl of the Streets |
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 Mansfield Park by Jane Austen: out into a shrubbery in fine weather."
Mr. Rushworth was eager to assure her ladyship of his
acquiescence, and tried to make out something complimentary;
but, between his submission to _her_ taste, and his having
always intended the same himself, with the superadded
objects of professing attention to the comfort of ladies
in general, and of insinuating that there was one only whom
he was anxious to please, he grew puzzled, and Edmund was
glad to put an end to his speech by a proposal of wine.
Mr. Rushworth, however, though not usually a great talker,
had still more to say on the subject next his heart.
Mansfield Park |
