| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Touchstone by Edith Wharton: had not known it would be like this. . . .
He understood now that, at the moment of selling the letters, he
had viewed the transaction solely as it affected himself: as an
unfortunate blemish on an otherwise presentable record. He had
scarcely considered the act in relation to Margaret Aubyn; for
death, if it hallows, also makes innocuous. Glennard's God was a
god of the living, of the immediate, the actual, the tangible; all
his days he had lived in the presence of that god, heedless of the
divinities who, below the surface of our deeds and passions,
silently forge the fatal weapons of the dead.
VII
|
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 Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas: was without shutters, but had the half-curtains closely drawn.
He mounted the skirting stone that his eyes might look over the curtain.
By the light of a lamp he saw a woman, wrapped in a dark mantle, seated
upon a stool near a dying fire. Her elbows were placed upon a mean
table, and she leaned her head upon her two hands, which were white as
ivory.
He could not distinguish her countenance, but a sinister smile passed
over the lips of Athos. He was not deceived; it was she whom he sought.
At this moment a horse neighed. Milady raised her head, saw close to
the panes the pale face of Athos, and screamed.
Athos, perceiving that she knew him, pushed the window with his knee and
The Three Musketeers |
