| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift: may incur some censure, and not unjustly; for I confess I owe the
preserving of mine eyes, and consequently my liberty, to my own
great rashness and want of experience; because, if I had then
known the nature of princes and ministers, which I have since
observed in many other courts, and their methods of treating
criminals less obnoxious than myself, I should, with great
alacrity and readiness, have submitted to so easy a punishment.
But hurried on by the precipitancy of youth, and having his
imperial majesty's license to pay my attendance upon the emperor
of Blefuscu, I took this opportunity, before the three days were
elapsed, to send a letter to my friend the secretary, signifying
Gulliver's Travels |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Phaedo by Plato: entering we found Socrates just released from chains, and Xanthippe, whom
you know, sitting by him, and holding his child in her arms. When she saw
us she uttered a cry and said, as women will: 'O Socrates, this is the
last time that either you will converse with your friends, or they with
you.' Socrates turned to Crito and said: 'Crito, let some one take her
home.' Some of Crito's people accordingly led her away, crying out and
beating herself. And when she was gone, Socrates, sitting up on the couch,
bent and rubbed his leg, saying, as he was rubbing: How singular is the
thing called pleasure, and how curiously related to pain, which might be
thought to be the opposite of it; for they are never present to a man at
the same instant, and yet he who pursues either is generally compelled to
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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 Mosses From An Old Manse by Nathaniel Hawthorne: of her forsaken home seemed to encircle her; she no longer saw
the gloomy pines, nor heard the wind which still, as she began
each verse, sent a heavy breath through the branches, and died
away in a hollow moan from the burden of the song. She was
aroused by the report of a gun in the vicinity of the encampment;
and either the sudden sound, or her loneliness by the glowing
fire, caused her to tremble violently. The next moment she
laughed in the pride of a mother's heart.
"My beautiful young hunter! My boy has slain a deer!" she
exclaimed, recollecting that in the direction whence the shot
proceeded Cyrus had gone to the chase.
Mosses From An Old Manse |
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 Edingburgh Picturesque Notes by Robert Louis Stevenson: place. And all over the world, in London, in Canada, in
New Zealand, fancy what a multitude of people could
exclaim with truth: 'The house that I was born in fell
last night!'
CHAPTER III.
THE PARLIAMENT CLOSE.
TIME has wrought its changes most notably around the
precincts of St. Giles's Church. The church itself, if
it were not for the spire, would be unrecognisable; the
KRAMES are all gone, not a shop is left to shelter in its
buttresses; and zealous magistrates and a misguided
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