| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Exiles by Honore de Balzac: the table but a writing-case and some sheets of parchment; and as she
could not read, this discovery told her nothing. A woman's instinct
then took her into the young man's room, and from thence she descried
her two lodgers crossing the river in the ferry boat.
"They stand like two statues," said she to herself. "Ah, ha! They are
landing at the Rue du Fouarre. How nimble he is, the sweet youth! He
jumped out like a bird. By him the old man looks like some stone saint
in the Cathedral.--They are going to the old School of the Four
Nations. Presto! they are out of sight.--And this is where he lives,
poor cherub!" she went on, looking about the room. "How smart and
winning he is! Ah! your fine gentry are made of other stuff than we
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Paradise Lost by John Milton: Knowledge of good bought dear by knowing ill.
Southward through Eden went a river large,
Nor changed his course, but through the shaggy hill
Passed underneath ingulfed; for God had thrown
That mountain as his garden-mould high raised
Upon the rapid current, which, through veins
Of porous earth with kindly thirst up-drawn,
Rose a fresh fountain, and with many a rill
Watered the garden; thence united fell
Down the steep glade, and met the nether flood,
Which from his darksome passage now appears,
Paradise Lost |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from A Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe: heard him say he had the plague, she screamed out and fell down into
a swoon, or in a fit, which, though she recovered a little, yet killed her
in a very few days; and I never heard whether she had the plague or no.
Another infected person came and knocked at the door of a citizen's
house where they knew him very well; the servant let him in, and
being told the master of the house was above, he ran up and came into
the room to them as the whole family was at supper. They began to
rise up, a little surprised, not knowing what the matter was; but he bid
them sit still, he only came to take his leave of them. They asked him,
'Why, Mr -, where are you going?' 'Going,' says he; 'I have got the
sickness, and shall die tomorrow night.' 'Tis easy to believe, though
A Journal of the Plague Year |
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 Salammbo by Gustave Flaubert: the captains of the Spartan phalanxes and the chiefs of the Barbarian
cohorts soon arrived with the insignia of their rank, and in the
armour of their nation. Night had fallen, a great tumult was spreading
throughout the plain; fires were burning here and there; and the
soldiers kept going from one to another asking what the matter was,
and why the Suffet did not distribute the money?
He was setting the infinite burdens of the Republic before the
captains. Her treasury was empty. The tribute to Rome was crushing
her. "We are quite at a loss what to do! She is much to be pitied!"
From time to time he would rub his limbs with his aloe-wood spatula,
or perhaps he would break off to drink a ptisan made of the ashes of a
Salammbo |
