| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Wrecker by Stevenson & Osbourne: "What sort of a place is it inside?" inquired Trent, sudden as
though Wicks had touched a spring.
"It's a good enough lagoon--a few horses' heads, but nothing to
mention," answered Wicks.
"I've a good mind to go in," said Trent. "I was new rigged in
China; it's given very bad, and I'm getting frightened for my
sticks. We could set it up as good as new in a day. For I
daresay your lot would turn to and give us a hand?"
"You see if we don't!" said Wicks.
"So be it, then," concluded Trent. "A stitch in time saves nine."
They returned on deck; Wicks cried the news to the Currency
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Girl with the Golden Eyes by Honore de Balzac: children informed of the relations he created for them in all parts.
That is a slightly inconvenient form of civilization; it has so many
advantages that we must overlook its drawbacks in consideration of its
benefits. Lord Dudley, to make no more words of it, came to Paris in
1816 to take refuge from the pursuit of English justice, which
protects nothing Oriental except commerce. The exiled lord, when he
saw Henri, asked who that handsome young man might be. Then, upon
hearing the name, "Ah, it is my son. . . . What a pity!" he said.
Such was the story of the young man who, about the middle of the month
of April, 1815, was walking indolently up the broad avenue of the
Tuileries, after the fashion of all those animals who, knowing their
The Girl with the Golden Eyes |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Walking by Henry David Thoreau: here, and, if I were a broker, I should probably take that
disturbance into account.
"Than longen folk to gon on pilgrimages,
And palmeres for to seken strange strondes."
Every sunset which I witness inspires me with the desire to go to
a West as distant and as fair as that into which the sun goes
down. He appears to migrate westward daily, and tempt us to
follow him. He is the Great Western Pioneer whom the nations
follow. We dream all night of those mountain-ridges in the
horizon, though they may be of vapor only, which were last gilded
by his rays. The island of Atlantis, and the islands and gardens
Walking |
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 Man against the Sky by Edwin Arlington Robinson: And fades, and she secures him.
The falling leaf inaugurates
The reign of her confusion;
The pounding wave reverberates
The dirge of her illusion;
And home, where passion lived and died,
Becomes a place where she can hide,
While all the town and harbor side
Vibrate with her seclusion.
We tell you, tapping on our brows,
The story as it should be, --
|
