| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Herland by Charlotte Gilman: philosophize about what was then a continual astonishment and
often a temporary tragedy.
The "long suit" in most courtships is sex attraction, of course.
Then gradually develops such comradeship as the two temperaments
allow. Then, after marriage, there is either the establishment
of a slow-growing, widely based friendship, the deepest, tenderest,
sweetest of relations, all lit and warmed by the recurrent flame
of love; or else that process is reversed, love cools and fades,
no friendship grows, the whole relation turns from beauty to ashes.
Here everything was different. There was no sex-feeling to
appeal to, or practically none. Two thousand years' disuse had
Herland |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Crowd by Gustave le Bon: they become identical with ordinary heterogeneous crowds, and
their sentiments in consequence present the peculiarity of being
always extreme. They will be seen to commit acts of the greatest
heroism or the worst excesses. The individual is no longer
himself, and so entirely is this the case that he will vote
measures most adverse to his personal interests.
The history of the French Revolution shows to what an extent
assemblies are capable of losing their self-consciousness, and of
obeying suggestions most contrary to their interests. It was an
enormous sacrifice for the nobility to renounce its privileges,
yet it did so without hesitation on a famous night during the
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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 The Underdogs by Mariano Azuela: reached out, seized the other's hair and pulled with all
her might. Camilla's horse shied; Camilla, trying to brush
her hair back from over her eyes, abandoned the reins.
She hesitated, lost her balance and fell in the road, striking
her forehead against the stones.
War Paint, weeping with laughter, pressed on with ut-
most skill and caught Camilla's horse.
"Come on, Tenderfoot; here's a job for you," Pan-
cracio said as he saw Camilla on Demetrio's saddle, her
face covered with blood.
Luis Cervantes hurried toward her with some cotton;
The Underdogs |
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 Paz by Honore de Balzac: at all in his line as a grand seigneur.
Behind the house lay the verdant velvet of an English lawn shaded at
the lower end by a clump of exotic trees, in the midst of which stood
a Chinese pagoda with soundless belfries and motionless golden eggs.
The greenhouse concealed the garden wall on the northern side, the
opposite wall was covered with climbing plants trained upon poles
painted green and connected with crossway trellises. This lawn, this
world of flowers, the gravelled paths, the simulated forest, the
verdant palisades, were contained within the space of five and twenty
square rods, which are worth to-day four hundred thousand francs,--the
value of an actual forest. Here, in this solitude in the middle of
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