| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Prufrock/Other Observations by T. S. Eliot: Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,
And seeing that it was a soft October night,
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.
And indeed there will be time
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;
Prufrock/Other Observations |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau by Honore de Balzac: turned on its hinges he would rise and face the great orator, and say
to him, "I am Birotteau!" The grenadier who sprang first into the
redoubt at Moscow displayed no greater courage than Cesar now summoned
up to perform this act.
"After all, I am his mayor," he said to himself as he rose to proclaim
his name.
The countenance of Francois Keller at once became affable; he
evidently desired to be cordial. He glanced at Cesar's red ribbon, and
stepping back, opened the door of his study and motioned him to enter,
remaining himself for some time to speak with two men, who rushed in
from the staircase with the violence of a waterspout.
Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Enoch Arden, &c. by Alfred Tennyson: Not knowing--Enoch was so brown, so bow'd,
So broken--all the story of his house.
His baby's death, her growing poverty,
How Philip put her little ones to school,
And kept them in it, his long wooing her,
Her slow consent, and marriage, and the birth
Of Philip's child: and o'er his countenance
No shadow past, nor motion: anyone,
Regarding, well had deem'd he felt the tale
Less than the teller: only when she closed
`Enoch, poor man, was cast away and lost'
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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 A Prince of Bohemia by Honore de Balzac: hundred gas-jets pouring upon her,' Mme. Anselme Popinot remarked
naively.
"From this point of view, July 1830 inaugurated an era not unlike the
time of the Empire, when a waiting woman was received at Court in the
person of Mme. Garat, a chief-justice's 'lady.' Tullia had completely
broken, as you may guess, with all her old associates; of her former
acquaintances, she only recognized those who could not compromise her.
At the time of her marriage she had taken a very charming little hotel
between a court and a garden, lavishing money on it with wild
extravagance and putting the best part of her furniture and du Bruel's
into it. Everything that she thought common or ordinary was sold. To
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