| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Market-Place by Harold Frederic: I kind o' suspect that you and I'd never have got much beyond
a nodding acquaintance--and even that mostly on my side.
I don't mean that I intended to conceal anything--that is,
not specially--but I've often thought since that it
was a mighty good thing I did. Now isn't that true--that
if you had taken me for one of your own countrymen you'd
have given me the cold shoulder?"
"I dare say there's a good deal in what you say,"
the other admitted, gently enough, but without contrition.
"Things naturally shape themselves that way, rather,
you know. If they didn't, why then the whole position
The Market-Place |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Extracts From Adam's Diary by Mark Twain: curiosity, I think, to see what the milk is there for. They never
drink it.
Three Months Later
The kangaroo still continues to grow, which is very strange and
perplexing. I never knew one to be so long getting its growth.
It has fur on its head now; not like kangaroo fur, but exactly
like our hair, except that it is much finer and softer, and instead
of being black is red. I am like to lose my mind over the capricious
and harassing developments of this unclassifiable zoological freak.
If I could catch another one--but that is hopeless; it is a new
variety, and the only sample; this is plain. But I caught a true
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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 Death of the Lion by Henry James: in question is a manuscript, and I've a foreboding that it's the
noble morsel he read me six weeks ago. When I expressed my
surprise that he should have bandied about anything so precious (I
happen to know it's his only copy - in the most beautiful hand in
all the world) Lady Augusta confessed to me that she hadn't had it
from himself, but from Mrs. Wimbush, who had wished to give her a
glimpse of it as a salve for her not being able to stay and hear it
read.
"'Is that the piece he's to read,' I asked, 'when Guy Walsingham
arrives?'
"'It's not for Guy Walsingham they're waiting now, it's for Dora
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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 Sons and Lovers by D. H. Lawrence: started home. Miriam loitered behind, alone. She did not
fit in with the others; she could very rarely get into human
relations with anyone: so her friend, her companion, her lover,
was Nature. She saw the sun declining wanly. In the dusky,
cold hedgerows were some red leaves. She lingered to gather them,
tenderly, passionately. The love in her finger-tips caressed
the leaves; the passion in her heart came to a glow upon the leaves.
Suddenly she realised she was alone in a strange road,
and she hurried forward. Turning a corner in the lane, she came
upon Paul, who stood bent over something, his mind fixed on it,
working away steadily, patiently, a little hopelessly. She hesitated
Sons and Lovers |
