| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Lady Windermere's Fan by Oscar Wilde: husband's birthday present to me. You know to-day is my birthday?
LORD DARLINGTON. No? Is it really?
LADY WINDERMERE. Yes, I'm of age to-day. Quite an important day
in my life, isn't it? That is why I am giving this party tonight.
Do sit down. [Still arranging flowers.]
LORD DARLINGTON. [Sitting down.] I wish I had known it was your
birthday, Lady Windermere. I would have covered the whole street
in front of your house with flowers for you to walk on. They are
made for you. [A short pause.]
LADY WINDERMERE. Lord Darlington, you annoyed me last night at the
Foreign Office. I am afraid you are going to annoy me again.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Second Inaugural Address by Abraham Lincoln: that this interest was, somehow, the cause of the war. To strengthen,
perpetuate, and extend this interest was the object for which the
insurgents would rend the Union, even by war; while the government claimed
no right to do more than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it.
Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration
which it has already attained. Neither anticipated that the cause
of the conflict might cease with, or even before, the conflict itself
should cease. Each looked for an easier triumph, and a result less
fundamental and astounding. Both read the same Bible, and pray
to the same God; and each invokes his aid against the other.
It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's
Second Inaugural Address |
