| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Lover's Complaint by William Shakespeare: As compound love to physic your cold breast.
'My parts had pow'r to charm a sacred nun,
Who, disciplin'd and dieted in grace,
Believ'd her eyes when they t oassail begun,
All vows and consecrations giving place.
O most potential love! vow, bond, nor space,
In thee hath neither sting, knot, nor confine,
For thou art all, and all things else are thine.
'When thou impressest, what are precepts worth
Of stale example? When thou wilt inflame,
How coldly those impediments stand forth,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Mother by Owen Wister: us?"
"No, it is not that."
"It can't be that he has given up the one he expected to tell us and can
think of no other?"
"Oh, no; he is going to tell that one."
"And you don't like his choice?"
"He won't tell me what it is!" Mrs. Davenport put down her embroidery.
"Then, Ethel," she laid with severity, "the fault is yours. When I had
been five years married, Mr. Davenport confided everything to me."
"So does Richard. Except when I particularly ask him."
"There it is, Ethel. You let him see that you want to know."
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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 Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave by Frederick Douglass:
I was now getting, as I have said, one dollar and
fifty cents per day. I contracted for it; I earned it;
it was paid to me; it was rightfully my own; yet,
upon each returning Saturday night, I was compelled
to deliver every cent of that money to Master Hugh.
And why? Not because he earned it,--not because
he had any hand in earning it,--not because I owed
it to him,--nor because he possessed the slightest
shadow of a right to it; but solely because he had
the power to compel me to give it up. The right of
The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave |
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 Kwaidan by Lafcadio Hearn: sleeper painlessly; and the dead face smiled.
The young man told his mother of what he had seen in the cemetery.
"Ah!" exclaimed the widow, "then it must have been Akiko!"...
But who was Akiko, mother?" the nephew asked.
The widow answered:--
"When your good uncle was young he was betrothed to a charming girl called
Akiko, the daughter of a neighbor. Akiko died of consumption, only a little
before the day appointed for the wedding; and her promised husband sorrowed
greatly. After Akiko had been buried, he made a vow never to marry; and he
built this little house beside the cemetery, so that he might be always
near her grave. All this happened more than fifty years ago. And every day
Kwaidan |
