| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Exiles by Honore de Balzac: of washing for the Cathedral--which was certainly not a bad customer.
On the first floor were two rooms, let to lodgers at a rent, one year
with another, of forty sous /Parisis/ each, an exorbitant sum, that
was however justified by the luxury Tirechair had lavished on their
adornment. Flanders tapestry hung on the walls, and a large bed with a
top valance of green serge, like a peasant's bed, was amply furnished
with mattresses, and covered with good sheets of fine linen. Each room
had a stove called a /chauffe-doux/; the floor, carefully polished by
Dame Tirechair's apprentices, shone like the woodwork of a shrine.
Instead of stools, the lodgers had deep chairs of carved walnut, the
spoils probably of some raided castle. Two chests with pewter
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Lesser Hippias by Plato: magnanimity which has hitherto characterized you. If a person were to ask
you what is the sum of 3 multiplied by 700, would not you be the best and
most consistent teller of a falsehood, having always the power of speaking
falsely as you have of speaking truly, about these same matters, if you
wanted to tell a falsehood, and not to answer truly? Would the ignorant
man be better able to tell a falsehood in matters of calculation than you
would be, if you chose? Might he not sometimes stumble upon the truth,
when he wanted to tell a lie, because he did not know, whereas you who are
the wise man, if you wanted to tell a lie would always and consistently
lie?
HIPPIAS: Yes, there you are quite right.
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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 Georgics by Virgil: The terrors of her wrath, a plague devised
Against the heifer sprung from Inachus.
From this too thou, since in the noontide heats
'Tis most persistent, fend thy teeming herds,
And feed them when the sun is newly risen,
Or the first stars are ushering in the night.
But, yeaning ended, all their tender care
Is to the calves transferred; at once with marks
They brand them, both to designate their race,
And which to rear for breeding, or devote
As altar-victims, or to cleave the ground
Georgics |
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 House of Mirth by Edith Wharton: But Miss Farish could not pause over the legacies; she broke into
a larger indignation. "Oh, Lily, it's unjust; it's cruel--Grace
Stepney must FEEL she has no right to all that money!"
"Any one who knew how to please Aunt Julia has a right to her
money," Miss Bart rejoined philosophically.
"But she was devoted to you--she led every one to think--" Gerty
checked herself in evident embarrassment, and Miss Bart turned to
her with a direct look. "Gerty, be honest: this will was made
only six weeks ago. She had heard of my break with the Dorsets?"
"Every one heard, of course, that there had been some
disagreement--some misunderstanding---"
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