| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Phoenix and the Turtle by William Shakespeare: That defunctive music can,
Be the death-defying swan,
Lest the requiem lack his right.
And thou, treble-dated crow,
That thy sable gender mak'st
With the breath thou giv'st and tak'st,
'Mongst our mourners shalt thou go.
Here the anthem doth commence:
Love and constancy is dead;
Phoenix and the turtle fled
In a mutual flame from hence.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton by Edith Wharton: the limit of the room. Arment looked toward the door; then his
embarrassed glance returned to Julia.
"I am very sorry," he said awkwardly.
"Thank you," she murmured.
"But I don't see--"
"No--but you will--in a moment. Won't you listen to me?
Please!" Instinctively she had shifted her position putting
herself between him and the door. "It happened this morning,"
she went on in short breathless phrases. "I never suspected
anything--I thought we were--perfectly happy. . . Suddenly he
told me he was tired of me . . . there is a girl he likes better. . .
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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 A House of Pomegranates by Oscar Wilde: his own house and knocked.
And when his wife opened the door and saw that her husband had
returned safe to her, she put her arms round his neck and kissed
him, and took from his back the bundle of faggots, and brushed the
snow off his boots, and bade him come in.
But he said to her, 'I have found something in the forest, and I
have brought it to thee to have care of it,' and he stirred not
from the threshold.
'What is it?' she cried. 'Show it to me, for the house is bare,
and we have need of many things.' And he drew the cloak back, and
showed her the sleeping child.
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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 Girl with the Golden Eyes by Honore de Balzac: be bought or made drunk, a letter opened, read of course, and a love-
letter slipped in before it is sealed up again. The old tyrant,
/crudel tirano/, is certain to know the person who writes the letters
from London, and has ceased to be suspicious of them."
The day after, De Marsay came again to walk on the Terrasse des
Feuillants, and saw Paquita Valdes; already passion had embellished
her for him. Seriously, he was wild for those eyes, whose rays seemed
akin to those which the sun emits, and whose ardor set the seal upon
that of her perfect body, in which all was delight. De Marsay was on
fire to brush the dress of this enchanting girl as they passed one
another in their walk; but his attempts were always vain. But at one
The Girl with the Golden Eyes |
