| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Reason Discourse by Rene Descartes: I was induced to seek some other method which would comprise the
advantages of the three and be exempt from their defects. And as a
multitude of laws often only hampers justice, so that a state is best
governed when, with few laws, these are rigidly administered; in like
manner, instead of the great number of precepts of which logic is
composed, I believed that the four following would prove perfectly
sufficient for me, provided I took the firm and unwavering resolution
never in a single instance to fail in observing them.
The first was never to accept anything for true which I did not clearly know
to be such; that is to say, carefully to avoid precipitancy and prejudice,
and to comprise nothing more in my judgement than what was presented to
Reason Discourse |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Stories From the Old Attic by Robert Harris: "Go take your religion to a church and keep it away from
serious people," the man concluded, stomping out of the room.
In the weeks that followed, the traveler was ridiculed
and denounced in the newspapers, being called everything from a
con artist to a prospective mental patient. (The scientific
journals said nothing about the man because they considered the
whole matter as beneath serious thought.) As a result, the
traveler was often left to himself, and so he pulled out his
tiny portable television set and began to watch it. Just by
chance, some visitors happened to come by and see the little
box. They were very impressed and urged the traveler to market
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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 Herodias by Gustave Flaubert: vaults, with pillars set at regular distances. The first vault opened
contained old armour; the second was full of pikes, with long points
emerging from tufts of feathers. The walls of the third chamber were
hung with a kind of tapestry made of slender reeds, laid in
perpendicular rows. Those of the fourth were covered with scimitars.
In the middle of the fifth cell, rows of helmets were seen, the crests
of which looked like a battalion of fiery serpents. The sixth cell
contained nothing but empty quivers; the seventh, greaves for
protecting the legs in battle; the eighth vault was filled with
bracelets and armlets; and an examination of the remaining vaults
disclosed forks, grappling-irons, ladders, cords, even catapults, and
Herodias |
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 Across The Plains by Robert Louis Stevenson: the kingdom of heaven maim; another to maim yourself and stay
without. And the kingdom of heaven is of the child-like, of those
who are easy to please, who love and who give pleasure. Mighty men
of their hands, the smiters and the builders and the judges, have
lived long and done sternly and yet preserved this lovely
character; and among our carpet interests and twopenny concerns,
the shame were indelible if WE should lose it. Gentleness and
cheerfulness, these come before all morality; they are the perfect
duties. And it is the trouble with moral men that they have
neither one nor other. It was the moral man, the Pharisee, whom
Christ could not away with. If your morals make you dreary, depend
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