| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Alkahest by Honore de Balzac: that they have never risen, in any direction, above the level of this
present earth. The sole idea they have ever conceived of the future is
that of a thrifty, prosaic statecraft: their revolutionary vigor came
from a domestic desire to live as they liked, with their elbows on the
table, and to take their ease under the projecting roofs of their own
porches.
The consciousness of well-being and the spirit of independence which
comes of prosperity begot in Flanders, sooner than elsewhere, that
craving for liberty which, later, permeated all Europe. Thus the
compactness of their ideas, and the tenacity which education grafted
on their nature made the Flemish people a formidable body of men in
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Treatise on Parents and Children by George Bernard Shaw: I do not contend that he was a conspicuously good one. But as
compared with the conventional good father who deliberately imposes
himself on his son as a god; who takes advantage of childish credulity
and parent worship to persuade his son that what he approves of is
right and what he disapproves of is wrong; who imposes a corresponding
conduct on the child by a system of prohibitions and penalties,
rewards and eulogies, for which he claims divine sanction: compared
to this sort of abortionist and monster maker, I say, Place appears
almost as a Providence. Not that it is possible to live with children
any more than with grown-up people without imposing rules of conduct
on them. There is a point at which every person with human nerves has
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Common Sense by Thomas Paine: The two first, by being hereditary, are independent of the people;
wherefore in a CONSTITUTIONAL SENSE they contribute nothing towards
the freedom of the state.
To say that the constitution of England is a UNION of three powers
reciprocally CHECKING each other, is farcical, either the words have
no meaning, or they are flat contradictions.
To say that the commons is a check upon the king, presupposes two things:
FIRST - That the king is not to be trusted without being looked after,
or in other words, that a thirst for absolute power is the natural
disease of monarchy.
SECONDLY - That the commons, by being appointed for that purpose,
Common Sense |
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 Call of the Wild by Jack London: formed, fissures sprang and spread apart, while thin sections of
ice fell through bodily into the river. And amid all this
bursting, rending, throbbing of awakening life, under the blazing
sun and through the soft-sighing breezes, like wayfarers to death,
staggered the two men, the woman, and the huskies.
With the dogs falling, Mercedes weeping and riding, Hal swearing
innocuously, and Charles's eyes wistfully watering, they staggered
into John Thornton's camp at the mouth of White River. When they
halted, the dogs dropped down as though they had all been struck
dead. Mercedes dried her eyes and looked at John Thornton.
Charles sat down on a log to rest. He sat down very slowly and
|
