| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Moll Flanders by Daniel Defoe: she, 'that whatever you think fit to do or say to me, it shall be
all a secret as it is, as much as if I were in my grave.'
He was astonished at her discourse, and said gravely to her,
'Madam, you are a stranger to me, but it is very unfortunate
that you should be let into the secret of the worst action of
my life, and a thing that I am so justly ashamed of, that the
only satisfaction of it to me was, that I thought it was known
only to God any my own conscience.' 'Pray, sir,' says she,
'do not reckon the discovery of it to me to be any part of your
misfortune. It was a thing, I believe, you were surprised into,
and perhaps the woman used some art to prompt you to it;
Moll Flanders |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Fanny Herself by Edna Ferber: don't see why we have to go on carrying only the most
hideous crudities in our women's dress department. I know
that the majority of our women customers wouldn't wear a
plain, good looking little blue serge dress with a white
collar, and some tailored buttons. They want cerise satin
revers on a plum-colored foulard, and that's what we've been
giving them. But there are plenty of other women living
miles from anywhere who know what's being worn on Fifth
avenue. I don't know how they know it, but they do. And
they want it. Why can't we reach those women, as well as
their shoddier sisters? The North American people do it.
Fanny Herself |
| 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: do become Pikes. But, doubtless, divers Pikes are bred after this
manner, or are brought into some ponds some such Other ways as is
past man's finding out, of which we have daily testimonies.
Sir Francis Bacon, in his History of Life and Death, observes the Pike to
be the longest lived of any fresh-water fish; and yet he computes it to be
not usually above forty years; and others think it to be not above ten
years: and yet Gesner mentions a Pike taken in Swedeland, in the year
1449, with a ring about his neck, declaring he was put into that pond by
Frederick the Second, more than two hundred years before he was last
taken, as by the inscription in that ring, being Greek, was interpreted by
the then Bishop of Worms. But of this no more; but that it is observed,
|
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 Return of Tarzan by Edgar Rice Burroughs: fixed upon the sun.
For ten minutes or more they kept up their monotonous
chant and steps, and then suddenly, and in perfect unison,
they turned toward their victim with upraised bludgeons
and emitting fearful howls, the while they contorted their
features into the most diabolical expressions, they rushed
upon him.
At the same instant a female figure dashed into the midst
of the bloodthirsty horde, and, with a bludgeon similar to
their own, except that it was wrought from gold, beat back
the advancing men.
The Return of Tarzan |
