| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Woman and Labour by Olive Schreiner: his offspring or exposing his female infants to death, often develops, with
the increase of culture and intelligence, into the extremely devoted and
self-sacrificing male progenitor of civilised societies; so, yet even more
markedly, does the female relation with her offspring, become intensified
and permanent, as culture and intelligence and virility increase. The
Bushwoman, like the lowest female barbarians in our own societies, will
often readily dispose of her infant son for a bottle of spirits or a little
coin; and even among somewhat more mentally developed females, strong as is
the affection of the average female for her new born offspring, the
closeness of the relation between mother and child tends rapidly to shrink
as time passes, so that by the time of adolescence is reached the relation
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Cousin Pons by Honore de Balzac: this feat a man needs thews and sinews, and our two friends, be it
remembered, had that affection of the heart which cripples all
ambitious effort.
Pons, as a rule, only went to his theatre towards eight o'clock, when
the piece in favor came on, and overtures and accompaniments needed
the strict ruling of the baton; most minor theatres are lax in such
matters, and Pons felt the more at ease because he himself had been by
no means grasping in all his dealings with the management; and
Schmucke, if need be, could take his place. Time went by, and Schmucke
became an institution in the orchestra; the Illustrious Gaudissart
said nothing, but he was well aware of the value of Pons'
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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 The Wheels of Chance by H. G. Wells: silence under her benign influence, under the benediction of her
light, rode our two wanderers side by side through the
transfigured and transfiguring night.
Nowhere was the moon shining quite so brightly as in Mr.
Hoopdriver's skull. At the turnings of the road he made his
decisions with an air of profound promptitude (and quite
haphazard). "The Right," he would say. Or again "The Left," as
one who knew. So it was that in the space of an hour they came
abruptly down a little lane, full tilt upon the sea. Grey beach
to the right of them and to the left, and a little white cottage
fast asleep inland of a sleeping fishing-boat. "Hullo!" said Mr.
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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 Russia in 1919 by Arthur Ransome: various fronts. Here, in the centre, the revolution was
an established fact. People had ceased to wonder when it
would end, were settling into their places in the new social
order, and took their pleasures not as if they were plucking
flowers on their way to execution, but in the ordinary routine
of life.
The play is well known, a drama of bourgeois society in a
small country place. A poor landowner scraping money for
an elder brother in the town, realizing at last that the brother
was not the genius for whom such sacrifice was worth while;
a doctor with a love for forestry and dreams of the future;
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