| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from From London to Land's End by Daniel Defoe: as provided for their own sick or poor, repairing their own roads,
and the like. This exemption from rent and taxes to continue for
twenty years, and then to pay each 50 pounds a year to the queen--
that is to say, to the Crown.
To each of these families, whom I would now call farmers, it was
proposed to advance 200 pounds in ready money as a stock to set
them to work; to furnish them with cattle, horses, cows, hogs, &c.;
and to hire and pay labourers to inclose, clear, and cure the land,
which it would be supposed the first year would not be so much to
their advantage as afterwards, allowing them timber out of the
forest to build themselves houses and barns, sheds and offices, as
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Gobseck by Honore de Balzac: touch of the claws of Necessity. In the Rue Montmartre I thrust open
the old gateway of a poor-looking house, and looked into a dark
courtyard where the sunlight never shines. The porter's lodge was
grimy, the window looked like the sleeve of some shabby wadded gown--
greasy, dirty, and full of holes.
" ' "Mlle. Fanny Malvaut?"
" ' "She has gone out; but if you have come about a bill, the money is
waiting for you."
" ' "I will look in again," said I.
" 'As soon as I knew that the porter had the money for me, I wanted to
know what the girl was like; I pictured her as pretty. The rest of the
Gobseck |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Twelve Stories and a Dream by H. G. Wells: that had gathered in the upper valley.
He straightened his back, fretted with his bridle, puckered his lips
to whistle, and simply sighed. He turned in his saddle for a time,
and stared at the throat of the mountain gorge out of which they
had come. Blank! Blank slopes on either side, with never a sign
of a decent beast or tree--much less a man. What a land it was!
What a wilderness! He dropped again into his former pose.
It filled him with a momentary pleasure to see a wry stick of purple
black flash out into the form of a snake, and vanish amidst the brown.
After all, the infernal valley WAS alive. And then, to rejoice him
still more, came a little breath across his face, a whisper that
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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 In Darkest England and The Way Out by General William Booth: poor wanderers should in the second Adam "all be made alive," ought we
not to put forth some effort to effect their restoration to that share
in the heritage of lab our which is theirs by right of descent from the
first Adam?
CHAPTER 4. THE OUT-OF-WORKS
There is hardly any more pathetic figure than that of the strong able
worker crying plaintively in the midst of our palaces and churches not
for charity, but for work, asking only to be allowed the privilege of
perpetual hard labour, that thereby he may earn wherewith to fill his
empty belly and silence the cry of his children for food. Crying for it
and not getting it, seeking for labour as lost treasure and finding it
In Darkest England and The Way Out |
