| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Poems of Goethe, Bowring, Tr. by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe: Hurrah!
And left my native land in haste.
Lack-a-day!
But not a single thing seem'd good,
The beds were bad, and strange the food,
And I not understood.
I placed my trust in rank and fame,
Hurrah!
Another put me straight to shame,
Lack-a-day!
And as I had been prominent,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Little Britain by Washington Irving: were the belles of Little Britain, and everybody was pleased
when Old Lamb had made money enough to shut up shop, and
put his name on a brass plate on his door. In an evil hour,
however, one of the Miss Lambs had the honor of being a lady
in attendance on the Lady Mayoress, at her grand annual ball,
on which occasion she wore three towering ostrich feathers on
her head. The family never got over it; they were immediately
smitten with a passion for high life; set up a one-horse
carriage,
put a bit of gold lace round the errand boy's hat, and have been
the talk and detestation of the whole neighborhood ever since.
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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 First Inaugural Address by Abraham Lincoln: to very high respect and consideration in all parallel cases by all other
departments of the government. And while it is obviously possible that
such decision may be erroneous in any given case, still the evil effect
following it, being limited to that particular case, with the chance that
it may be overruled and never become a precedent for other cases,
can better be borne than could the evils of a different practice.
At the same time, the candid citizen must confess that if the policy
of the government, upon vital questions affecting the whole people,
is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court,
the instant they are made, in ordinary litigation between parties
in personal actions, the people will have ceased to be their own rulers,
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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 Dreams & Dust by Don Marquis: In dances bold and bacchanal--
For them, for me, you hold in pawn,
My lands--not thine!
TO A DANCING DOLL
FORMAL, quaint, precise, and trim,
You begin your steps demurely--
There's a spirit almost prim
In the feet that move so surely,
So discreetly, to the chime
Of the music that so sweetly
Marks the time.
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