| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Voyage Out by Virginia Woolf: her mind, she started off, "Anyhow, I'm going to ask your advice.
D'you ever get into a state where you don't know your own mind?
That's the state I'm in now. You see, last night at the dance
Raymond Oliver,--he's the tall dark boy who looks as if he had Indian
blood in him, but he says he's not really,--well, we were sitting
out together, and he told me all about himself, how unhappy he is
at home, and how he hates being out here. They've put him into some
beastly mining business. He says it's beastly--I should like it,
I know, but that's neither here nor there. And I felt awfully sorry
for him, one couldn't help being sorry for him, and when he asked me
to let him kiss me, I did. I don't see any harm in that, do you?
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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 Brother of Daphne by Dornford Yates: the corner. I'm not in love with you, and I don't want never
to leave your side again, but- oh, you understand, Mermaid, don't
you? You look as if you could if you liked."
My companion stared out to sea with a faint smile on her lips. I
flung out an arm with a gesture of despair.
"Oh, if you knew how sick I am of the girl about town, the girl
of to-day, who won't be natural herself, and won't let you be
natural either, who is always bored, and who has no use for
anyone who isn't forever making mock love to her, or- Why on
earth can't a man tell a woman he likes her company, and mean
it, without the woman thinking he wants to kiss her, or marry
The Brother of Daphne |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Happy Prince and Other Tales by Oscar Wilde: He swooped past the match-girl, and slipped the jewel into the palm
of her hand. "What a lovely bit of glass," cried the little girl;
and she ran home, laughing.
Then the Swallow came back to the Prince. "You are blind now," he
said, "so I will stay with you always."
"No, little Swallow," said the poor Prince, "you must go away to
Egypt."
"I will stay with you always," said the Swallow, and he slept at
the Prince's feet.
All the next day he sat on the Prince's shoulder, and told him
stories of what he had seen in strange lands. He told him of the
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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 The Smalcald Articles by Dr. Martin Luther: the old dragon, and is the origin, power [life], and strength
of all heresy, especially of that of the Papacy and Mahomet.
Therefore we ought and must constantly maintain this point,
that God does not wish to deal with us otherwise than through
the spoken Word and the Sacraments. It is the devil himself
whatsoever is extolled as Spirit without the Word and
Sacraments. For God wished to appear even to Moses through the
burning bush and spoken Word; and no prophet neither Elijah
nor Elisha, received the Spirit without the Ten Commandments
[or spoken Word]. Neither was John the Baptist conceived
without the preceding word of Gabriel, nor did he leap in his
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