| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Facino Cane by Honore de Balzac: realities cannot rob him of the glory of his dreams. Then I traced
back a course of life for this latest scion of a race of condottieri,
tracking down his misfortunes, looking for the reasons of the deep
moral and physical degradation out of which the lately revived sparks
of greatness and nobility shone so much the more brightly. My ideas,
no doubt, were passing through his mind, for all processes of thought-
communications are far more swift, I think, in blind people, because
their blindness compels them to concentrate their attention. I had not
long to wait for proof that we were in sympathy in this way. Facino
Cane left off playing, and came up to me. "Let us go out!" he said;
his tones thrilled through me like an electric shock. I gave him my
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Polity of Athenians and Lacedaemonians by Xenophon: youths; to divert the eyes of some bronze stature were less difficult.
And as to quiet bearing, no bride ever stepped in bridal bower[6] with
more natural modesty. Note them when they have reached the public
table.[7] The plainest answer to the question asked--that is all you
need expect to hear from their lips.
[4] See Cic. "pro Coelio," 5.
[5] See Plat. "Charmid." 159 B; Jowett, "Plato," I. 15.
[6] Longinus, {peri ups}, iv. 4, reading {ophthalmois} for
{thalamois}, says: "Yet why speak of Timaeus, when even men like
Xenophon and Plato, the very demigods of literature, though they
had sat at the feet of Socrates, sometimes forget themselves in
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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 A Book of Remarkable Criminals by H. B. Irving: writes a French judge, "lust, idleness, anger, hatred, revenge,
these are the chief causes of crime. These passions and desires
are shared by rich and poor alike, by the educated and
uneducated. They are inherent in human nature; the germ is in
every man."
Convicts represent those wrong-doers who have taken to a
particular form of wrong-doing punishable by law. Of the larger
army of bad men they represent a minority, who have been
found out in a peculiarly unsatisfactory kind of misconduct.
There are many men, some lying, unscrupulous, dishonest, others
cruel, selfish, vicious, who go through life without ever doing
A Book of Remarkable Criminals |
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 Voyage of the Beagle by Charles Darwin: therefore most elevated, house in the valley. The number of
inhabitants became scanty; but wherever water could be
brought on the land, it was very fertile. All the main valleys
in the Cordillera are characterized by having, on both sides, a
fringe or terrace of shingle and sand, rudely stratified, and
generally of considerable thickness. These fringes evidently
once extended across the valleys and were united; and the
bottoms of the valleys in northern Chile, where there are no
streams, are thus smoothly filled up. On these fringes the
roads are generally carried, for their surfaces are even, and
they rise, with a very gentle slope up the valleys: hence, also,
The Voyage of the Beagle |
