| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from An Ideal Husband by Oscar Wilde: article, and arranging the foulness of the public placard.
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Stop! You want me to withdraw the report and
to make a short speech stating that I believe there are possibilities
in the scheme?
MRS. CHEVELEY. [Sitting down on the sofa.] Those are my terms.
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. [In a low voice.] I will give you any sum of
money you want.
MRS. CHEVELEY. Even you are not rich enough, Sir Robert, to buy back
your past. No man is.
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. I will not do what you ask me. I will not.
MRS. CHEVELEY. You have to. If you don't . . . [Rises from the
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Life in the Iron-Mills by Rebecca Davis: he could be down there. It was just a step. So easy, as it
seemed, so natural to go! Yet it could never be--not in all the
thousands of years to come--that he should put his foot on that
street again! He thought of himself with a sorrowful pity, as
of some one else. There was a dog down in the market, walking
after his master with such a stately, grave look!--only a dog,
yet he could go backwards and forwards just as he pleased: he
had good luck! Why, the very vilest cur, yelping there in the
gutter, had not lived his life, had been free to act out
whatever thought God had put into his brain; while he--No, he
would not think of that! He tried to put the thought away, and
Life in the Iron-Mills |
