| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Lost Continent by Edgar Rice Burroughs: England merely emigrated from their ruined cities and their
devastated, blood-drenched fields to the mainland, in the
hope of finding, in the domain of the conquered enemy,
cities and farms which would replace those they had lost.
The learned professor assumes that while a long-continued
war had strengthened rather than weakened the instinct of
paternal devotion, it had also dulled other humanitarian
instincts, and raised to the first magnitude the law of the
survival of the fittest, with the result that when the
exodus took place the strong, the intelligent, and the
cunning, together with their offspring, crossed the waters
Lost Continent |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Buttered Side Down by Edna Ferber: what I spend in face powder and toilette water and hairpins alone,
you'd think I'd made a mistake and given you the butcher bill
instead. And I'm no professional beauty, either. Only it takes
money to look cleaned and pressed in this town."
In the seclusion of the cafe corner, Gabe laid one plump,
highly manicured hand on Effie's smooth arm. "You wouldn't need to
stay young for me, Effie. I like you just as you are, with
out the powder, or the toilette water, or the hair-pins."
His red, good-natured face had an expression upon it that was
touchingly near patient resignation as he looked up into Effie's
sparkling countenance. "You never looked so good to me as you do
Buttered Side Down |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Euthydemus by Plato: plays of words received serious attention; in which contradiction itself
was denied, and, on the one hand, every predicate was affirmed to be true
of every subject, and on the other, it was held that no predicate was true
of any subject, and that nothing was, or was known, or could be spoken.
Let us imagine disputes carried on with religious earnestness and more than
scholastic subtlety, in which the catchwords of philosophy are completely
detached from their context. (Compare Theaet.) To such disputes the
humour, whether of Plato in the ancient, or of Pope and Swift in the modern
world, is the natural enemy. Nor must we forget that in modern times also
there is no fallacy so gross, no trick of language so transparent, no
abstraction so barren and unmeaning, no form of thought so contradictory to
|
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 St. Ives by Robert Louis Stevenson: 'I believe I am cutting the last strand that connects you with
common sense,' he replied. 'But that is the plain English of it.
You are not even to write; and if you did, I would not answer.'
'A letter, however - ' I began.
'Listen to me,' interrupted Romaine. 'So soon as your cousin reads
the paragraph, what will he do? Put the police upon looking into
my correspondence! So soon as you write to me, in short, you write
to Bow Street; and if you will take my advice, you will date that
letter from France.'
'The devil!' said I, for I began suddenly to see that this might
put me out of the way of my business.
|
