| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Frankenstein by Mary Shelley: the middle of the month of August, nearly two months after the
death of Justine, that miserable epoch from which I dated all my woe.
The weight upon my spirit was sensibly lightened as I plunged yet deeper
in the ravine of Arve. The immense mountains and precipices that
overhung me on every side, the sound of the river raging among the rocks,
and the dashing of the waterfalls around spoke of a power mighty as
Omnipotence--and I ceased to fear or to bend before any being less
almighty than that which had created and ruled the elements,
here displayed in their most terrific guise. Still, as I ascended higher,
the valley assumed a more magnificent and astonishing character.
Ruined castles hanging on the precipices of piny mountains,
Frankenstein |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Pair of Blue Eyes by Thomas Hardy: claim to Elfride, would, if uttered when the man was younger, have
provoked such a query as, 'Come, tell me all about it, my lad,'
from Knight, and Stephen would straightway have delivered himself
of all he knew on the subject.
Stephen the ingenuous boy, though now obliterated externally by
Stephen the contriving man, returned to Knight's memory vividly
that afternoon. He was at present but a sojourner in London; and
after attending to the two or three matters of business which
remained to be done that day, he walked abstractedly into the
gloomy corridors of the British Museum for the half-hour previous
to their closing. That meeting with Smith had reunited the
A Pair of Blue Eyes |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Sarrasine by Honore de Balzac: say:
"Oh! you describe me to suit your own taste. A strange kind of
tyranny! You wish me not to be /myself/!"
"Oh! I wish nothing," I cried, alarmed by the severity of her manner.
"At all events, it is true, is it not, that you like to hear stories
of the fierce passions, kindled in our heart by the enchanting women
of the South?"
"Yes. And then?"
"Why, I will come to your house about nine o'clock to-morrow evening,
and elucidate this mystery for you."
"No," she replied, with a pout; "I wish it done now."
|
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 The War in the Air by H. G. Wells: in the possibilities of the Smallways blood.
Go-ahead Times!
Old Smallways would sit over the fire mumbling of the greatness
of other days, of old Sir Peter, who drove his coach to Brighton
and back in eight-and-twenty hours, of old Sir Peter's white
top-hats, of Lady Bone, who never set foot to ground except to
walk in the garden, of the great, prize-fights at Crawley. He
talked of pink and pig-skin breeches, of foxes at Ring's Bottom,
where now the County Council pauper lunatics were enclosed, of
Lady Bone's chintzes and crinolines. Nobody heeded him. The
world had thrown up a new type of gentleman altogether--a
|
