| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Garden Party by Katherine Mansfield: didn't tell some one; and who was there to tell? But when I went to bed--I
was sleeping in Mrs. James's bedroom, our cook that was, at the time--as
soon as the lights was out, there they were, my donkeys, jingling along,
with their neat little feet and sad eyes...Well, madam, would you believe
it, I waited for a long time and pretended to be asleep, and then suddenly
I sat up and called out as loud as I could, "I do want to go on a donkey.
I do want a donkey-ride!" You see, I had to say it, and I thought they
wouldn't laugh at me if they knew I was only dreaming. Artful--wasn't it?
Just what a silly child would think...
...No, madam, never now. Of course, I did think of it at one time. But it
wasn't to be. He had a little flower-shop just down the road and across
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Koran: men, and do not remember God, except a few; wavering between the
two, neither to these nor yet to those! but whomsoever God doth lead
astray thou shall not find for him a way.
O ye who believe! take not misbelievers for patrons rather than
believers; do ye wish to make for God a power against you?
Verily, the hypocrites are in the lowest depths of hell-fire, and
thou shalt not find for them a help.
Save those who turn again, and do right, and take tight hold on God,
and are sincere in religion to God; these are with the believers,
and God will give to the believers mighty hire.
Why should God punish you, if ye are grateful and believe? for God
The Koran |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Walking by Henry David Thoreau: pines have developed their delicate blossoms on the highest twigs
of the wood every summer for ages, as well over the heads of
Nature's red children as of her white ones; yet scarcely a farmer
or hunter in the land has ever seen them.
Above all, we cannot afford not to live in the present. He is
blessed over all mortals who loses no moment of the passing life
in remembering the past. Unless our philosophy hears the cock
crow in every barnyard within our horizon, it is belated. That
sound commonly reminds us that we are growing rusty and antique
in our employments and habits of thoughts. His philosophy comes
down to a more recent time than ours. There is something
Walking |
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 Life of the Spider by J. Henri Fabre: the abdomen, the subject of the experiment resists for some time.
I have seen a Grasshopper, bitten in the belly, cling firmly for
fifteen hours to the smooth, upright wall of the glass bell that
constituted his prison. At last, he dropped off and died. Where
the Bee, that delicate organism, succumbs in less than half an
hour, the Grasshopper, coarse ruminant that he is, resists for a
whole day. Put aside these differences, caused by unequal degrees
of organic sensitiveness, and we sum up as follows: when bitten by
the Tarantula in the neck, an insect, chosen from among the
largest, dies on the spot; when bitten elsewhere, it perishes also,
but after a lapse of time which varies considerably in the
The Life of the Spider |
