| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from King James Bible: that Jerusalem was taken: and he was there when Jerusalem was taken.
JER 39:1 In the ninth year of Zedekiah king of Judah, in the tenth
month, came Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon and all his army against
Jerusalem, and they besieged it.
JER 39:2 And in the eleventh year of Zedekiah, in the fourth month, the
ninth day of the month, the city was broken up.
JER 39:3 And all the princes of the king of Babylon came in, and sat in
the middle gate, even Nergalsharezer, Samgarnebo, Sarsechim, Rabsaris,
Nergalsharezer, Rabmag, with all the residue of the princes of the king
of Babylon.
JER 39:4 And it came to pass, that when Zedekiah the king of Judah saw
King James Bible |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Vicar of Tours by Honore de Balzac: him; then he remained, as his habit was, absorbed in somnolent
musings. The servant's custom was to make the fire and gently draw him
from his half sleep by the murmured sound of her movements,--a sort of
music which he loved. Twenty minutes passed and Marianne had not
appeared. The vicar, now half a canon, was about to ring again, when
he let go the bell-pull, hearing a man's step on the staircase. In a
minute more the Abbe Troubert, after discreetly knocking at the door,
obeyed Birotteau's invitation and entered the room. This visit, which
the two abbe's usually paid each other once a month, was no surprise
to the vicar. The canon at once exclaimed when he saw that Marianne
had not made the fire of his quasi-colleague. He opened the window and
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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 The Time Machine by H. G. Wells: the form of it. I had a vague sense of something familiar, but I
could not tell what it was at the time.
`Still, however helpless the little people in the presence of
their mysterious Fear, I was differently constituted. I came out
of this age of ours, this ripe prime of the human race, when Fear
does not paralyse and mystery has lost its terrors. I at least
would defend myself. Without further delay I determined to make
myself arms and a fastness where I might sleep. With that refuge
as a base, I could face this strange world with some of that
confidence I had lost in realizing to what creatures night by
night I lay exposed. I felt I could never sleep again until my
The Time Machine |
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 Fables by Robert Louis Stevenson: I pray God this may be a dream, and I may find my father dancing."
So he went on after the bloodless thing that had escaped; and in
the way he met the appearance of his mother, and she wept. "What
have you done?" she cried. "What is this that you have done? Oh,
come home (where you may be by bedtime) ere you do more ill to me
and mine; for it is enough to smite my brother and your father."
"Dear mother, it is not these that I have smitten," said Jack; "it
was but the enchanter in their shape. And even if I had, it would
not prove that a man should wear a gyve on his right leg."
And at this the appearance gobbled like a turkey.
He never knew how he did that; but he swung the sword on the one
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