| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Secret Sharer by Joseph Conrad: than before at the closeness of the shave, and marveling at
that something unyielding in his character which was carrying
him through so finely. There was no agitation in his whisper.
Whoever was being driven distracted, it was not he. He was sane.
And the proof of his sanity was continued when he took up
the whispering again.
"It would never do for me to come to life again."
It was something that a ghost might have said. But what he was alluding
to was his old captain's reluctant admission of the theory of suicide.
It would obviously serve his turn--if I had understood at all the view
which seemed to govern the unalterable purpose of his action.
The Secret Sharer |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Hellenica by Xenophon: goblets and other gear such as a man like Pharnabazus would have, not
to speak of much baggage and many baggage animals. It was the dread of
being surrounded and besieged, if he should establish himself for long
at any one spot, which induced Pharnabazus to flee in gipsy fashion
from point to point over the country, carefully obliterating his
encampments. Now as the Paphlagonians and Spithridates brought back
the captured property, they were met by Herippidas with his brigadiers
and captains, who stopped them and[7] relieved them of all they had;
the object being to have as large a list as possible of captures to
deliver over to the officers who superintended the sale of booty.[8]
This treatment the Asiatics found intolerable. They deemed themselves
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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 To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf: saw him gazing at Mrs Ramsay was a rapture, equivalent, Lily felt, to the
loves of dozens of young men (and perhaps Mrs Ramsay had never excited the
loves of dozens of young men). It was love, she thought, pretending to
move her canvas, distilled and filtered; love that never attempted to
clutch its object; but, like the love which mathematicians bear their
symbols, or poets their phrases, was meant to be spread over the world and
become part of the human gain. So it was indeed. The world by all means
should have shared it, could Mr Bankes have said why that woman pleased
him so; why the sight of her reading a fairy tale to her boy had upon him
precisely the same effect as the solution of a scientific problem, so that
he rested in contemplation of it, and felt, as he felt when he had proved
To the Lighthouse |
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 Little Britain by Washington Irving: good-for-nothing personage, I have been considered the only
gentleman by profession in the place. I stand therefore in high
favor with both parties, and have to hear all their cabinet
councils and mutual backbitings. As I am too civil not to agree
with the ladies on all occasions, I have committed myself most
horribly with both parties, by abusing their opponents. I might
manage to reconcile this to my conscience, which is a truly
accommodating one, but I cannot to my apprehension--if the
Lambs and Trotters ever come to a reconciliation, and compare
notes, I am ruined!
I have determined, therefore, to beat a retreat in time, and am
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