| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Tanglewood Tales by Nathaniel Hawthorne: figure-head for your galley."
Accordingly, Jason took the branch at its word, and lopped it
off the tree. A carver in the neighborhood engaged to make the
figurehead. He was a tolerably good workman, and had already
carved several figure-heads, in what he intended for feminine
shapes, and looking pretty much like those which we see
nowadays stuck up under a vessel's bowsprit, with great staring
eyes, that never wink at the dash of the spray. But (what was
very strange) the carver found that his hand was guided by some
unseen power, and by a skill beyond his own, and that his tools
shaped out an image which he had never dreamed of. When the
Tanglewood Tales |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Main Street by Sinclair Lewis: Vida Sherwin could not come to tea. She wandered
through the house, empty as the bleary street without. The
problem of "Will the doctor be home in time for supper, or
shall I sit down without him?" was important in the household.
Six was the rigid, the canonical supper-hour, but at
half-past six he had not come. Much speculation with Bea:
Had the obstetrical case taken longer than he had expected?
Had he been called somewhere else? Was the snow much
heavier out in the country, so that he should have taken a
buggy, or even a cutter, instead of the car? Here in town it
had melted a lot, but still----
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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 Virginibus Puerisque by Robert Louis Stevenson: flew out seven great eagles which seemed to marshal the Romans
on their way; they did not pause or waver, but disappeared
into the forest where the enemy lay concealed. "Forward!"
cried Germanicus, with a fine rhetorical inspiration,
"Forward! and follow the Roman birds." It would be a very
heavy spirit that did not give a leap at such a signal, and a
very timorous one that continued to have any doubt of success.
To appropriate the eagles as fellow-countrymen was to make
imaginary allies of the forces of nature; the Roman Empire and
its military fortunes, and along with these the prospects of
those individual Roman legionaries now fording a river in
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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 Riders of the Purple Sage by Zane Grey: that strange streak of Milly's, takin' up with the new religion
as she had, an' she believed Milly ran off with the Mormon. That
hastened mother's death, an' she died unforgivin'. Father wasn't
the kind to bow down under disgrace or misfortune but he had
surpassin' love for Milly, an' the loss of her broke him.
"From the minute I heard of Milly's disappearance I never
believed she went off of her own free will. I knew Milly, an' I
knew she couldn't have done that. I stayed at home awhile, tryin'
to make Frank Erne talk. But if he knowed anythin' then he
wouldn't tell it. So I set out to find Milly. An' I tried to get
on the trail of that proselyter. I knew if I ever struck a town
Riders of the Purple Sage |
