| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Troll Garden and Selected Stories by Willa Cather: followed them, Eric felt. And here he was, nearing Red Oak,
Iowa, and rocking backward and forward in despair. Never had he
loved his brother so much, and never had the big world called to
him so hard. But there was a lump in his throat which would not
go down. Ever since nightfall he had been tormented by the
thought of his mother, alone in that big house that had sent
forth so many men. Her unkindness now seemed so little, and her
loneliness so great. He remembered everything she had ever done
for him: how frightened she had been when he tore his hand in the
corn-sheller, and how she wouldn't let Olaf scold him. When Nils
went away he didn't leave his mother all alone, or he would never
The Troll Garden and Selected Stories |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Travels of Sir John Mandeville by Sir John Mandeville: when they be young, and nourish them so with alms, as many as they
may find. And I asked them if it had not been better to have given
that relief to poor men, rather than to those beasts. And they
answered me and said, that they had no poor men amongst them in
that country; and though it had been so that poor men had been
among them, yet were it greater alms to give it to those souls that
do there their penance. Many other marvels be in that city and in
the country thereabout, that were too long to tell you.
From that city go men by the country a six journeys to another city
that men clepe Chilenfo, of the which city the walls be twenty mile
about. In that city be sixty bridges of stone, so fair that no man
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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 Taming of the Shrew by William Shakespeare: And offer me disguis'd in sober robes,
To old Baptista as a schoolmaster
Well seen in music, to instruct Bianca;
That so I may, by this device at least
Have leave and leisure to make love to her,
And unsuspected court her by herself.
GRUMIO.
Here's no knavery! See, to beguile the old folks, how the
young folks lay their heads together!
[Enter GREMIO, and LUCENTIO disguised, with books under his arm.]
Master, master, look about you: who goes there, ha?
The Taming of the Shrew |
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 Paz by Honore de Balzac: "I know Adam so well that I am certain he could forget me for some
mountebank like your Malaga. Where did you first see her?"
"At Saint-Cloud, last September, on the fete-day. She was at a corner
of a booth covered with flags, where the shows are given. Her
comrades, all in Polish costumes, were making a horrible racket. I
watched her standing there, silent and dumb, and I thought I saw a
melancholy expression in her face; in truth there was enough about her
to sadden a girl of twenty. That touched me."
The countess was sitting in a delicious attitude, pensive and rather
melancholy.
"Poor, poor Thaddeus!" she exclaimed. Then, with the kindliness of a
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