| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Passionate Pilgrim by William Shakespeare: Thus vainly thinking that she thinks me young,
Although I know my years be past the best,
I smiling credit her false-speaking tongue,
Outfacing faults in love with love's ill rest.
But wherefore says my love that she is young?
And wherefore say not I that I am old?
O, love's best habit is a soothing tongue,
And age, in love, loves not to have years told.
Therefore, I'll lie with love, and love with me,
Since that our faults in love thus smother'd be.
II.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Red Inn by Honore de Balzac: prudent operation demanded.
"I accept," said the merchant; "in fact I will admit," he added,
lowering his voice and looking at the two Frenchmen, "that I desired
it. My boatmen seem to me suspicious. I am not sorry to spend the
night with two brave young men, two French soldiers, for, between
ourselves, I have a hundred thousand francs in gold and diamonds in my
valise."
The friendly caution with which this imprudent confidence was received
by the two young men, seemed to reassure the German. The landlord
assisted in taking off one of the mattresses, and when all was
arranged for the best he bade them good-night and went off to bed.
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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 Across The Plains by Robert Louis Stevenson: disgusting, grows even welcome, in the course of years; a small
taste (if it be only genuine) waxes with indulgence into an
exclusive passion. Enough, just now, if you can look back over a
fair interval, and see that your chosen art has a little more than
held its own among the thronging interests of youth. Time will do
the rest, if devotion help it; and soon your every thought will be
engrossed in that beloved occupation.
But even with devotion, you may remind me, even with unfaltering
and delighted industry, many thousand artists spend their lives, if
the result be regarded, utterly in vain: a thousand artists, and
never one work of art. But the vast mass of mankind are incapable
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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 The Ebb-Tide by Stevenson & Osbourne: of a refuge always open to him, he had hitherto beguiled and
supported himself in the trials of life; and behold! that also
was only a fairy tale, that also was folk-lore. With the
consequences of his acts he saw himself implacably confronted for
the duration of life: stretched upon a cross, and nailed there
with the iron bolts of his own cowardice. He had no tears; he
told himself no stories. His disgust with himself was so complete
that even the process of apologetic mythology had ceased. He was
like a man cast down from a pillar, and every bone broken. He lay
there, and admitted the facts, and did not attempt to rise.
Dawn began to break over the far side of the atoll, the sky
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