| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from King Henry VI by William Shakespeare: [Enter HORNER and his man PETER, guarded.]
SUFFOLK.
Because here is a man accus'd of treason.
Pray God the Duke of York excuse himself!
YORK.
Doth any one accuse York for a traitor?
KING.
What mean'st thou, Suffolk? tell me, what are these?
SUFFOLK.
Please it your majesty, this is the man
That doth accuse his master of high treason.
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Prince of Bohemia by Honore de Balzac: dissent. 'I know all about it, du Bruel, my dear, I that have been
like a queen in my house all my life till I married you. My wishes
were guessed, fulfilled, and more than fulfilled. After all, I am
thirty-five, and at five-and-thirty a woman cannot expect to be loved.
Ah, if I were a girl of sixteen, if I had not lost something that is
dearly bought at the Opera, what attention you would pay me, M. du
Bruel! I feel the most supreme contempt for men who boast that they
can love and grow careless and neglectful in little things as time
grows on. You are short and insignificant, you see, du Bruel; you love
to torment a woman; it is your only way of showing your strength. A
Napoleon is ready to be swayed by the woman he loves; he loses nothing
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from A Horse's Tale by Mark Twain: time I got a harder master. They have been cruel, every one; they
have worked me night and day in degraded employments, and beaten
me; they have fed me ill, and some days not at all. And so I am
but bones, now, with a rough and frowsy skin humped and cornered
upon my shrunken body - that skin which was once so glossy, that
skin which she loved to stroke with her hand. I was the pride of
the mountains and the Great Plains; now I am a scarecrow and
despised. These piteous wrecks that are my comrades here say we
have reached the bottom of the scale, the final humiliation; they
say that when a horse is no longer worth the weeds and discarded
rubbish they feed to him, they sell him to the bull-ring for a
|
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 An Historical Mystery by Honore de Balzac: Madame d'Hauteserre.
"No," said Laurence; "we left the decision to fate and you are its
instrument."
She told of the agreement made that morning. The elder Simeuse,
watching the increasing pallor of his brother's face, was momentarily
on the point of crying out, "Marry her; I will go away and die!" Just
then, as the dessert was being served, all present heard raps upon the
window of the dining-room on the garden side. The eldest d'Hauteserre
opened it and gave entrance to the abbe, whose breeches were torn in
climbing over the walls of the park.
"Fly! they are coming to arrest you," he cried.
|
