| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Vendetta by Honore de Balzac: enchant them.
Soon, however, prudence and foresight drew the young couple from their
Eden; it was necessary to work to live. Ginevra, who possessed a
special talent for imitating old paintings, took up the business of
copying, and soon found many customers among the picture-dealers.
Luigi, on his side, sought long and actively for occupation, but it
was hard for a young officer whose talents had been restricted to the
study of strategy to find anything to do in Paris.
At last, weary of vain efforts, his soul filled with despair at seeing
the whole burden of their subsistence falling on Ginevra, it occurred
to him to make use of his handwriting, which was excellent. With a
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from On the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin: any other animal. This subject has been ably treated by several authors,
and I shall, in my future work, discuss some of the checks at considerable
length, more especially in regard to the feral animals of South America.
Here I will make only a few remarks, just to recall to the reader's mind
some of the chief points. Eggs or very young animals seem generally to
suffer most, but this is not invariably the case. With plants there is a
vast destruction of seeds, but, from some observations which I have made, I
believe that it is the seedlings which suffer most from germinating in
ground already thickly stocked with other plants. Seedlings, also, are
destroyed in vast numbers by various enemies; for instance, on a piece of
ground three feet long and two wide, dug and cleared, and where there could
On the Origin of Species |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Divine Comedy (translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) by Dante Alighieri: Neither their wax, nor that which tempers it,
Remains immutable, and hence beneath
The ideal signet more and less shines through;
Therefore it happens, that the selfsame tree
After its kind bears worse and better fruit,
And ye are born with characters diverse.
If in perfection tempered were the wax,
And were the heaven in its supremest virtue,
The brilliance of the seal would all appear;
But nature gives it evermore deficient,
In the like manner working as the artist,
The Divine Comedy (translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) |
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 Old Indian Legends by Zitkala-Sa: blew the water all over the people, so that many were burned and
could not see. Screaming with pain, they ran away.
"Oh, what shall we do with these dreadful ones?" they said.
Others exclaimed: "Let us carry them to the lake of muddy
water and drown them!"
Instantly they ran with them. They threw the Fish and the
Turtle into the lake. Toward the center of the large lake the
Turtle dived. There he peeped up out of the water and, waving a
hand at the crowd, sang out, "This is where I live!"
The Fish swam hither and thither with such frolicsome darts
that his back fin made the water fly. "E han!" whooped the Fish,
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