| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Ebb-Tide by Stevenson & Osbourne: long-suffering of the keepers of restaurants he fell to more open
charity upon the wayside; as time went on, good nature became
weary, and after a repulse or two, Herrick became shy. There
were women enough who would have supported a far worse
and a far uglier man; Herrick never met or never knew them: or
if he did both, some manlier feeling would revolt, and he
preferred starvation. Drenched with rains, broiling by day,
shivering by night, a disused and ruinous prison for a bedroom,
his diet begged or pilfered out of rubbish heaps, his associates
two creatures equally outcast with himself, he had drained for
months the cup of penitence. He had known what it was to be
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen: then with her fine handkerchief--it had such a delightful smell, that it was
to the pewter soldier just as if he had awaked from a trance.
"Let me see him," said the young man. He laughed, and then shook his head.
"Nay, it cannot be he; but he reminds me of a story about a pewter soldier
which I had when I was a little boy!" And then he told his wife about the old
house, and the old man, and about the pewter soldier that he sent over to him
because he was so very, very lonely; and he told it as correctly as it had
really been, so that the tears came into the eyes of his young wife, on
account of the old house and the old man.
"It may possibly be, however, that it is the same pewter soldier!" said she.
"I will take care of it, and remember all that you have told me; but you must
Fairy Tales |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Soul of Man by Oscar Wilde: closely bound up with our conceptions of property, and under
Socialism and Individualism will die out. It is remarkable that in
communistic tribes jealousy is entirely unknown.
Now as the State is not to govern, it may be asked what the State
is to do. The State is to be a voluntary association that will
organise labour, and be the manufacturer and distributor of
necessary commodities. The State is to make what is useful. The
individual is to make what is beautiful. And as I have mentioned
the word labour, I cannot help saying that a great deal of nonsense
is being written and talked nowadays about the dignity of manual
labour. There is nothing necessarily dignified about manual labour
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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 Outlaw of Torn by Edgar Rice Burroughs: thou not keep a still tongue in thy head and let his
patron saint look after the welfare of this princeling?
Your rashness has brought you to a pretty pass, for it
must be either you or I, My Lady, and it cannot be I.
Say thy prayers and compose thyself for death."
Henry III, King of England, sat in his council cham-
ber surrounded by the great lords and nobles who com-
posed his suit. He awaited Simon de Montfort, Earl of
Leicester, whom he had summoned that he might heap
still further indignities upon him with the intention of
degrading and humiliating him that he might leave
The Outlaw of Torn |
