| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from In the South Seas by Robert Louis Stevenson: were revolting public sentiment. The deposition of the chiefs was
perhaps sometimes needful; the appointment of others may have been
needful also; it was at least a delicate business. The Government
of George II. exiled many Highland magnates. It never occurred to
them to manufacture substitutes; and if the French have been more
bold, we have yet to see with what success.
Our chief at Anaho was always called, he always called himself,
Taipi-Kikino; and yet that was not his name, but only the wand of
his false position. As soon as he was appointed chief, his name -
which signified, if I remember exactly, PRINCE BORN AMONG FLOWERS -
fell in abeyance, and he was dubbed instead by the expressive
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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 Exiles by Honore de Balzac: proved the existence of the world of Matter, Doctor Sigier constructed
the scheme of a spiritual world dividing us from God by an ascending
scale of spheres, just as the plant is divided from man by an infinite
number of grades. He peopled the heavens, the stars, the planets, the
sun.
Quoting Saint Paul, he invested man with a new power; he might rise,
from globe to globe, to the very Fount of eternal life. Jacob's
mystical ladder was both the religious formula and the traditional
proof of the fact. He soared through space, carrying with him the
passionate souls of his hearers on the wings of his word, making them
feel the infinite, and bathing them in the heavenly sea. Then the
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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 Verses 1889-1896 by Rudyard Kipling: Me the Sea-captain loved, the River built,
Wealth sought and Kings adventured life to hold.
Hail, England! I am Asia -- Power on silt,
Death in my hands, but Gold!
MADRAS
Clive kissed me on the mouth and eyes and brow,
Wonderful kisses, so that I became
Crowned above Queens -- a withered beldame now,
Verses 1889-1896 |
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: Aldermanbury. His opinion is very much taken in affairs of
state, having read the Sunday papers for the last half century,
together with the "Gentleman's Magazine," Rapin's "History of
England," and the "Naval Chronicle." His head is stored with
invaluable maxims which have borne the test of time and use
for centuries. It is his firm opinion that "it is a moral
impossible," so long as England is true to herself, that anything
can shake her; and he has much to say on the subject of the
national debt, which, somehow or other, he proves to be a
great national bulwark and blessing. He passed the greater part
of his life in the purlieus of Little Britain, until of late
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