| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Riders of the Purple Sage by Zane Grey: passage, and their faces and whispers were faces and whispers of
a dream. He turned a corner to meet Tull face to face, eye to
eye. As once before he had seen this man pale to a ghastly, livid
white so again he saw the change. Tull stopped in his tracks,
with right hand raised and shaking. Suddenly it dropped, and he
seemed to glide aside, to pass out of Venters's sight. Next he
saw many horses with bridles down--all clean-limbed, dark bays or
blacks--rustlers' horses! Loud voices and boisterous laughter,
rattle of dice and scrape of chair and clink of gold, burst in
mingled din from an open doorway. He stepped inside.
With the sight of smoke-hazed room and drinking, cursing,
Riders of the Purple Sage |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Exiles by Honore de Balzac: sparkling water, the silent hills, the eloquent buildings. The city
spoke, it glittered, it called to me to return!
"Columns of smoke rose up by the side of the ancient pillars, whose
marble sheen gleamed white through the night; the lines of the horizon
were still visible through the mists of evening; all was harmony and
mystery. Nature would not say farewell; she desired to keep me there.
Ah! It was all in all to me; my mother and my child, my wife and my
glory! The very bells bewailed my condemnation. Oh, land of marvels!
It is as beautiful as heaven. From that hour the wide world has been
my dungeon. Beloved land, why hast thou rejected me?
"But I shall triumph there yet!" he cried, speaking with an accent of
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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 Anthem by Ayn Rand: But they looked upon us, and suddenly
we were afraid. For their eyes were still,
and small, and evil.
"Our brothers!" we cried. "Have you
nothing to say to us?"
Then Collective 0-0009 moved forward.
They moved to the table and the others followed.
"Yes," spoke Collective 0-0009,
"we have much to say to you."
The sound of their voices brought silence
to the hall and to beat of our heart.
Anthem |
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 Lily of the Valley by Honore de Balzac: Between you and me a lie is monstrous. Why did you forbid me to dry
your tears? were they mine?"
"I was thinking," she said, "that for me this illness has been a halt
in pain. Now that I no longer fear for Monsieur de Mortsauf I fear for
myself."
She was right. The count's recovery was soon attested by the return of
his fantastic humor. He began by saying that neither the countess, nor
I, nor the doctor had known how to take care of him; we were ignorant
of his constitution and also of his disease; we misunderstood his
sufferings and the necessary remedies. Origet, infatuated with his own
doctrines, had mistaken the case, he ought to have attended only to
The Lily of the Valley |
