| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Odyssey by Homer: thou art not sprung of oak or rock, whereof old tales
tell.'
And Odysseus of many counsels answered her and said:
'O wife revered of Odysseus, son of Laertes, wilt thou
never have done asking me about mine own race? Nay, but I
will tell thee: yet surely thou wilt give me over to
sorrows yet more than those wherein I am holden, for so it
ever is when a man has been afar from his own country, so
long as now I am, wandering in sore pain to many cities of
mortals. Yet even so I will tell thee what thou askest and
inquirest. There is a land called Crete in the midst of the
The Odyssey |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Red Inn by Honore de Balzac: ruminating animals; a condition which we may call the material
melancholy of gastronomy.
So the guests now turned spontaneously to the excellent German,
delighted to have a tale to listen to, even though it might prove of
no interest. During this blessed interregnum the voice of a narrator
is always delightful to our languid senses; it increases their
negative happiness. I, a seeker after impressions, admired the faces
about me, enlivened by smiles, beaming in the light of the wax
candles, and somewhat flushed by our late good cheer; their diverse
expressions producing piquant effects seen among the porcelain
baskets, the fruits, the glasses, and the candelabra.
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf: deprecated the scorn and anger of the world--she was witless, she knew
it), as she clutched the banisters and hauled herself upstairs and
rolled from room to room, she sang. Rubbing the glass of the long
looking-glass and leering sideways at her swinging figure a sound
issued from her lips--something that had been gay twenty years before
on the stage perhaps, had been toothless, bonneted, care-taking woman,
was robbed of meaning, was like the voice of witlessness, humour,
persistency itself, trodden down but springing up again, so that as she
lurched, dusting, wiping, she seemed to say how it was one long sorrow
and trouble, how it was getting up and going to bed again, and bringing
things out and putting them away again. It was not easy or snug this
To the Lighthouse |
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 King Lear by William Shakespeare: as
in part I understand them, are to blame.
Glou. Let's see, let's see!
Edm. I hope, for my brother's justification, he wrote this but
as
an essay or taste of my virtue.
Glou. (reads) 'This policy and reverence of age makes the world
bitter to the best of our times; keeps our fortunes from us
till our oldness cannot relish them. I begin to find an idle
and fond bondage in the oppression of aged tyranny, who
sways,
King Lear |
