| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from King Henry VI by William Shakespeare: RICHARD.
Three glorious suns, each one a perfect sun;
Not separated with the racking clouds,
But sever'd in a pale clear-shining sky.
See, see! they join, embrace, and seem to kiss,
As if they vow'd some league inviolable;
Now are they but one lamp, one light, one sun.
In this the heaven figures some event.
EDWARD.
'T is wondrous strange, the like yet never heard of.
I think it cites us, brother, to the field,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Faith of Men by Jack London: knife into the air, so now she felt impelled to spring upon this
woman and bear her back and down, and tear the life out of her fair
body. But Jees Uck was thinking quickly and gave no sign, and
Kitty Bonner little dreamed how intimately she had for an instant
been related with sudden death.
Jees Uck nodded her head that she understood, and Kitty Bonner
explained that Neil was expected at any moment. Then they sat down
on ridiculously comfortable chairs, and Kitty sought to entertain
her strange visitor, and Jees Uck strove to help her.
"You knew my husband in the North?" Kitty asked, once.
"Sure. I wash um clothes," Jees Uck had answered, her English
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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 Edingburgh Picturesque Notes by Robert Louis Stevenson: look down on the Castle with the city lying in waves
around it, those mad and dismal fanatics, the Sweet
Singers, haggard from long exposure on the moors, sat day
and night with 'tearful psalmns' to see Edinburgh
consumed with fire from heaven, like another Sodom or
Gomorrah. There, in the Grass-market, stiff-necked,
covenanting heroes, offered up the often unnecessary, but
not less honourable, sacrifice of their lives, and bade
eloquent farewell to sun, moon, and stars, and earthly
friendships, or died silent to the roll of drums. Down
by yon outlet rode Grahame of Claverhouse and his thirty
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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 The Odyssey by Homer: of many an ox, or whether to go straight up to Ulysses and
embrace his knees, but in the end he deemed it best to embrace
Ulysses' knees. So he laid his lyre on the ground between the
mixing bowl {175} and the silver-studded seat; then going up to
Ulysses he caught hold of his knees and said, "Ulysses, I
beseech you have mercy on me and spare me. You will be sorry for
it afterwards if you kill a bard who can sing both for gods and
men as I can. I make all my lays myself, and heaven visits me
with every kind of inspiration. I would sing to you as though
you were a god, do not therefore be in such a hurry to cut my
head off. Your own son Telemachus will tell you that I did not
The Odyssey |
