| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from On the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin: If we ask ourselves why this or that species is rare, we answer that
something is unfavourable in its conditions of life; but what that
something is, we can hardly ever tell. On the supposition of the fossil
horse still existing as a rare species, we might have felt certain from the
analogy of all other mammals, even of the slow-breeding elephant, and from
the history of the naturalisation of the domestic horse in South America,
that under more favourable conditions it would in a very few years have
stocked the whole continent. But we could not have told what the
unfavourable conditions were which checked its increase, whether some one
or several contingencies, and at what period of the horse's life, and in
what degree, they severally acted. If the conditions had gone on, however
On the Origin of Species |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Chance by Joseph Conrad: misunderstood--"
"Of course he would. Men are so conceited," I said.
I saw it well enough that he must have thought she had come down to
him. What else could he have thought? And then he had been
"gentleness itself." A new experience for that poor, delicate, and
yet so resisting creature. Gentleness in passion! What could have
been more seductive to the scared, starved heart of that girl?
Perhaps had he been violent, she might have told him that what she
came down to keep was the tryst of death--not of love. It occurred
to me as I looked at her, young, fragile in aspect, and intensely
alive in her quietness, that perhaps she did not know herself then
Chance |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Complete Angler by Izaak Walton: observations of the Carp, and then fall upon some directions how you
shall fish for him.
The age of Carps is by Sir Francis Bacon, in his History of Life and
Death, observed to be but ten years; yet others think they live longer.
Gesner says, a Carp has been known to live in the Palatine above a
hundred years But most conclude, that, contrary to the Pike or Luce, all
Carps are the better for age and bigness. The tongues of Carps are noted
to be choice and costly meat, especially to them that buy them: but
Gesner says, Carps have no tongue like other fish, but a piece of
fleshlike fish in their mouth like to a tongue, and should be called a
palate: but it is certain it is choicely good, and that the Carp is to be
|
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 Gobseck by Honore de Balzac: know what the girl was like; I pictured her as pretty. The rest of the
morning I spent in looking at the prints in the shop windows along the
boulevard; then, just as it struck twelve, I went through the
Countess' ante-chamber.
" ' "Madame has just this minute rung for me," said the maid; "I don't
think she can see you yet."
" ' "I will wait," said I, and sat down in an easy-chair.
" 'Venetian shutters were opened, and presently the maid came hurrying
back.
" ' "Come in, sir."
" 'From the sweet tone of the girl's voice, I knew that the mistress
Gobseck |
