| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Aeroplanes and Dirigibles of War by Frederick A. Talbot: closely to his enemy the possibility of hitting him is extremely
remote. Rifle or gun-fire must be absolutely point blank.
When a marauding aeroplane is espied the attacking corsair
immediately struggles for the strategical position, which is
above his adversary. To fire upwards from one aeroplane at
another is virtually impossible, at least with any degree of
accuracy. The marksman is at a hopeless disadvantage. If the
pilot be unaccompanied and entirely dependent upon his own
resources he cannot hope to fire vertically above him, for the
simple reason that in so doing he must relinquish control of his
machine. A rifle cannot possibly be sighted under such
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from When the Sleeper Wakes by H. G. Wells: of public exhibition! If it was he would give Warming
a piece of his mind. But it scarcely had that
character. And in a place of public exhibition he
would not have discovered himself naked.
Then suddenly, quite abruptly, he realised what had
happened. There was no perceptible interval of suspicion,
no dawn to his knowledge. Abruptly he
knew that his trance had lasted for a vast interval; as
if by some processes of thought reading he interpreted
the awe in the faces that peered into his. He looked
at them strangely, full of intense emotion. It seemed
When the Sleeper Wakes |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Options by O. Henry: from the coast--that's all they want to make 'cm happy. I've got 'em
well trained. They make their own clothes and hats out of a vegetable
fibre and straw, and they're a contented lot. It's a great thing,'
winds up Shane, 'to have made a people happy by the incultivation of
such simple institutions.'
"Well, the next day, with the King's permission, I has the McClintock
open up a couple of sacks of my goods in the little plaza of the
village. The Indians swarmed around by the hundred and looked the
bargain-counter over. I shook red blankets at 'em, flashed finger-
rings and ear-bobs, tried pearl necklaces and sidecombs on the women,
and a line of red hosiery on the men. 'Twas no use. They looked on
Options |
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 To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf: Dear, dear, Mrs Ramsay said to herself, how did they produce this
incongruous daughter? this tomboy Minta, with a hole in her stocking?
How did she exist in that portentous atmosphere where the maid was
always removing in a dust-pan the sand that the parrot had scattered,
and conversation was almost entirely reduced to the exploits--interesting
perhaps, but limited after all--of that bird? Naturally, one had asked
her to lunch, tea, dinner, finally to stay with them up at Finlay, which
had resulted in some friction with the Owl, her mother, and more calling,
and more conversation, and more sand, and really at the end of it, she had
told enough lies about parrots to last her a lifetime (so she had said
to her husband that night, coming back from the party). However,
To the Lighthouse |
