| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy: and the mixed character of her fellow-students, gathered together from all
parts of the diocese, and how she had to get up and work by gas-light in
the early morning, with all the bitterness of a young person to whom restraint
was new. To all this he listened; but it was not what he wanted especially
to know--her relations with Phillotson. That was what she did not tell.
When they had sat and eaten, Jude impulsively placed his hand upon hers;
she looked up and smiled, and took his quite freely into her own little
soft one, dividing his fingers and coolly examining them, as if they were the
fingers of a glove she was purchasing.
"Your hands are rather rough, Jude, aren't they?" she said.
"Yes. So would yours be if they held a mallet and chisel all day."
Jude the Obscure |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from 1984 by George Orwell: Something in the tone of his voice seemed to add, 'that bloody fool'.
Parsons, Winston's fellow-tenant at Victory Mansions, was in fact threading
his way across the room--a tubby, middle-sized man with fair hair and a
froglike face. At thirty-five he was already putting on rolls of fat at
neck and waistline, but his movements were brisk and boyish. His whole
appearance was that of a little boy grown large, so much so that although
he was wearing the regulation overalls, it was almost impossible not to
think of him as being dressed in the blue shorts, grey shirt, and red
neckerchief of the Spies. In visualizing him one saw always a picture of
dimpled knees and sleeves rolled back from pudgy forearms. Parsons did,
indeed, invariably revert to shorts when a community hike or any other
1984 |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Black Tulip by Alexandre Dumas: "Oh, Rosa, if you don't open the door to me," Cornelius
cried in his rage, "I shall force these bars, and kill
everything I find in the prison."
"Be merciful, be merciful, my friend!"
"I tell you, Rosa, that I shall demolish this prison, stone
for stone!" and the unfortunate man, whose strength was
increased tenfold by his rage, began to shake the door with
a great noise, little heeding that the thunder of his voice
was re-echoing through the spiral staircase.
Rosa, in her fright, made vain attempts to check this
furious outbreak.
The Black Tulip |
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 Essays of Francis Bacon by Francis Bacon: best pleased, when things go backward; which is
the worst property in a servant of a prince, or state.
Therefore it is good for princes, if they use ambi-
tious men, to handle it, so as they be still progres-
sive and not retrograde; which, because it cannot
be without inconvenience, it is good not to use such
natures at all. For if they rise not with their service,
they will take order, to make their service fall with
them. But since we have said, it were good not to
use men of ambitious natures, except it be upon
necessity, it is fit we speak, in what cases they are
Essays of Francis Bacon |
