| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Message by Honore de Balzac: maid, putting forward some feminine ailment as her excuse. We all
went early to bed.
As I passed the door of the Countess' room on the way to my
night's lodging, I asked the servant timidly for news of her. She
heard my voice, and would have me come in, and tried to talk, but
in vain--she could not utter a sound. She bent her head, and I
withdrew. In spite of the painful agitation, which I had felt to
the full as youth can feel, I fell asleep, tired out with my
forced march.
It was late in the night when I was awakened by the grating sound
of curtain rings drawn sharply over the metal rods. There sat the
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Prufrock/Other Observations by T. S. Eliot: * * * *
And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully!
Smoothed by long fingers,
Asleep ... tired ... or it malingers,
Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me.
Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,
Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?
But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,
Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter,
I am no prophet--and here’s no great matter;
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,
Prufrock/Other Observations |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Somebody's Little Girl by Martha Young: There were many other ladies on the Mall, and many ladies passed in
their walk by the stone bench where Bessie Bell and the lady sat.
Everybody loved to come to the Mall in the afternoon when the band
played. Everybody loved to hear the gay music. Everybody loved to
see the children in their prettiest clothes, and to see all the
nurses rolling the babies in the carriages with the pretty parasols.
And one of the ladies passing by looked over to the stone bench
where Bessie Bell sat with her hands folded on her blue checked
apron, and where the lady had seated herself just as Sister Helen
Vincula had sat before she went across the long bridge.
And the lady said, as she passed by and looked: ``Striking
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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 Bunner Sisters by Edith Wharton: Ramy's. It turned out there wasn't anything the matter with her--
nothin' on'y a speck of dust in the works--and he fixed her for me
in a minute and I brought her right back. Ain't it lovely to hear
her going again? But tell me about Miss Mellins, quick!"
For a moment Ann Eliza found no words. Not till she learned
that she had missed her chance did she understand how many hopes
had hung upon it. Even now she did not know why she had wanted so
much to see the clock-maker again.
"I s'pose it's because nothing's ever happened to me," she
thought, with a twinge of envy for the fate which gave
Evelina every opportunity that came their way. "She had the
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