| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Figure in the Carpet by Henry James: granted that she admitted you, as one of the highest privileges of
the relation in which you stood to her, to the knowledge of which
she was after Corvick's death the sole depositary? All I know is
that that knowledge is infinitely precious, and what I want you to
understand is that if you'll in your turn admit me to it you'll do
me a kindness for which I shall be lastingly grateful."
He had turned at last very red; I dare say he had begun by thinking
I had lost my wits. Little by little he followed me; on my own
side I stared with a livelier surprise. Then he spoke. "I don't
know what you're talking about."
He wasn't acting - it was the absurd truth.
|
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 Gettysburg Address by Abraham Lincoln: upon this continent a new nation: conceived in liberty, and
dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war. . .testing whether
that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated. . .
can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war.
We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting place
for those who here gave their lives that this nation might live.
It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate. . .we cannot consecrate. . .
we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead,
who struggled here have consecrated it, far above our poor power
|
