| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen: which, though it spoke compassion, spoke likewise restraint,
said, "I am afraid you have been long desiring my absence, nor
have I anything to plead in excuse of my stay, but real, though
unavailing concern. Would to Heaven that anything could be
either said or done on my part that might offer consolation to
such distress! But I will not torment you with vain wishes,
which may seem purposely to ask for your thanks. This
unfortunate affair will, I fear, prevent my sister's having the
pleasure of seeing you at Pemberley to-day."
"Oh, yes. Be so kind as to apologise for us to Miss Darcy. Say
that urgent business calls us home immediately. Conceal the
Pride and Prejudice |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Letters from England by Elizabeth Davis Bancroft: culture, and a use of the modern languages in our position would be
convenient. I do not know how a gentleman can get on without it
here, and I find it so desirable that I devote a good deal of time
to speaking French with Louisa's governess. Your father uses French
a great deal with his colleagues, who, many of them, speak English
with great difficulty, and some not at all. . . . Lady Charlotte
Lindsay came one day this week to engage us to dine with her on
Wednesday, but yesterday she came to say that she wanted Lord
Brougham to meet us, and he could not come till Friday. Fortunately
we had no dinner engagement on that day, and we are to meet also the
Miss Berrys; Horace Walpole's Miss Berrys, who with Lady Charlotte
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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 The Augsburg Confession by Philip Melanchthon: the part of bishops to bear with us by reason of the
Confession which we have now reviewed; because even the Canons
are not so severe as to demand the same rites everywhere,
neither, at any time, have the rites of all churches been the
same; although, among us, in large part, the ancient rites are
diligently observed. For it is a false and malicious charge
that all the ceremonies, all the things instituted of old, are
abolished in our churches. But it has been a common complaint
that some abuses were connected with the ordinary rites.
These, inasmuch as they could not be approved with a good
conscience, have been to some extent corrected.
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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 Children of the Night by Edwin Arlington Robinson: Or nothing at all, sometimes. I was watching
The slow, sweet scenes of a golden picture,
Flushed and alive with a long delusion
That made the murmur of home, when I shuddered
And felt like a knife that awful silence
That comes when the music goes -- forever.
The truth came over my life like a darkness
Over a forest where one man wanders,
Worse than alone. For a time I staggered
And stumbled on with a weak persistence
After the phantom of hope that darted
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