| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Moran of the Lady Letty by Frank Norris: The decks, masts, and rails of the schooner were shiny with a
black coating of dirt and grease; the sails were gray with grime;
a strangling odor of oil and tar, of cooking and of opium, of
Chinese punk and drying fish, pervaded all the air. In the waist,
Hoang and Jim, bare to the belt, their queues looped around their
necks to be out of the way, were stowing the dory and exchanging
high-pitched monosyllables. Miss Herrick's sister had not come
aboard. The three visitors--Jerry, Ridgeway, and Josie--stood
nervously huddled together, their elbows close in, as if to avoid
contact with the prevailing filth, their immaculate white outing-
clothes detaching themselves violently against the squalor and
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Democracy In America, Volume 2 by Alexis de Toqueville: they have found each other out, they combine. From that moment
they are no longer isolated men, but a power seen from afar,
whose actions serve for an example, and whose language is
listened to. The first time I heard in the United States that
100,000 men had bound themselves publicly to abstain from
spirituous liquors, it appeared to me more like a joke than a
serious engagement; and I did not at once perceive why these
temperate citizens could not content themselves with drinking
water by their own firesides. I at last understood that 300,000
Americans, alarmed by the progress of drunkenness around them,
had made up their minds to patronize temperance. They acted just
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Walking by Henry David Thoreau: which I had not seen before is sometimes as good as the dominions
of the King of Dahomey. There is in fact a sort of harmony
discoverable between the capabilities of the landscape within a
circle of ten miles' radius, or the limits of an afternoon walk,
and the threescore years and ten of human life. It will never
become quite familiar to you.
Nowadays almost all man's improvements, so called, as the
building of houses and the cutting down of the forest and of all
large trees, simply deform the landscape, and make it more and
more tame and cheap. A people who would begin by burning the
fences and let the forest stand! I saw the fences half consumed,
Walking |
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 Light of Western Stars by Zane Grey: Southwest. They indulged in the restful siesta during the heated
term of the day.
Madeline was awakened by Majesty's well-known whistle and
pounding on the gravel. Then she heard the other horses. When
she went out she found her party assembled in gala golf attire,
and with spirits to match their costumes. Castleton, especially,
appeared resplendent in a golf coat that beggared description.
Madeline had faint misgivings when she reflected on what Monty
and Nels and Nick might do under the influence of that blazing
garment.
"Oh. Majesty," cried Helen, as Madeline went up to her horse,
The Light of Western Stars |
