| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Atheist's Mass by Honore de Balzac: "I want to know the reason for what you have just been doing, and
why you founded this mass."
"Faith! my dear boy," said Desplein, "I am on the verge of the
tomb; I may safely tell you about the beginning of my life."
At this moment Bianchon and the great man were in the Rue des
Quatre-Vents, one of the worst streets in Paris. Desplein pointed
to the sixth floor of one of the houses looking like obelisks, of
which the narrow door opens into a passage with a winding
staircase at the end, with windows appropriately termed "borrowed
lights"--or, in French, jours de souffrance. It was a greenish
structure; the ground floor occupied by a furniture-dealer, while
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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 Bride of Lammermoor by Walter Scott: world. Let the house be redd up, the broken meat set bye, and if
there is ony thing totally uneatable, let it be gien to the puir
folk; and, gude mother and wife, I hae just ae thing to entreat
ye, that ye will never speak to me a single word, good or bad,
anent a' this nonsense wark, but keep a' your cracks about it to
yoursells and your kimmers, for my head is weel-nigh dung donnart
wi' it already."
As John's authority was tolerably absolute, all departed to
their usual occupations, leaving him to build castles in the air,
if he had a mind, upon the court favour which he had acquired by
the expenditure of his worldly substance.
The Bride of Lammermoor |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from A Pair of Blue Eyes by Thomas Hardy: from being salient, its horizontal section is concave. The sea,
rolling direct from the shores of North America, has in fact eaten
a chasm into the middle of a hill, and the giant, embayed and
unobtrusive, stands in the rear of pigmy supporters. Not least
singularly, neither hill, chasm, nor precipice has a name. On
this account I will call the precipice the Cliff without a Name.*
* See Preface
What gave an added terror to its height was its blackness. And
upon this dark face the beating of ten thousand west winds had
formed a kind of bloom, which had a visual effect not unlike that
of a Hambro' grape. Moreover it seemed to float off into the
A Pair of Blue Eyes |
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 Ursula by Honore de Balzac: wiping her eyes.
"The admiral does not know his nephew is in prison," said the Abbe
Chaperon at last; "the countess alone read your letter, and has
answered it for him. But you must decide at once on some course," he
added after a pause, "and this is what I have the honor to advise. Do
not sell your farm. The lease is just out, having lasted twenty-four
years; in a few months you can raise the rent to six thousand francs
and get a premium for double that amount. Borrow what you need of some
honest man,--not from the townspeople who make a business of
mortgages. Your neighbour here is a most worthy man; a man of good
society, who knew it as it was before the Revolution, who was once an
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