| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Sons and Lovers by D. H. Lawrence: They went into the garden. The sky behind the townlet and the
church was orange-red; the flower-garden was flooded with a strange
warm light that lifted every leaf into significance. Paul passed
along a fine row of sweet-peas, gathering a blossom here and there,
all cream and pale blue. Miriam followed, breathing the fragrance.
To her, flowers appealed with such strength she felt she must
make them part of herself. When she bent and breathed a flower,
it was as if she and the flower were loving each other. Paul hated
her for it. There seemed a sort of exposure about the action,
something too intimate.
When he had got a fair bunch, they returned to the house.
Sons and Lovers |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Apology by Xenophon: dia touto ekalei men Eurulokhos o Kharistios, ekalei de Skopas k
Kranonios, oukh ekista lontes, upiskhnoumenoi}. Cf. Diog. Laert.
ii. 31, {Kharmidou oiketas auto didontos, in' ap' auton
prosodeuoito, oukh eileto}. Cf. id. 65, 74.
[35] See "Hell." II. ii. 10.
[36] {oikteirein eautous}. See L. Dind. ad loc. For an incident in
point see "Mem." II. vii.
[37] Plat. "Rep." iii. 404 D, "refinements of Attic confectionery."
[38] {ek tes psukhes}, possibly "by a healthy appetite." Cf. "Symp."
iv. 41. The same sentiment "ex ore Antisthenis." See Joel, op.
cit. i. 382; Schanz, Plat. "Apol." p. 88, S. 26.
The Apology |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Catherine de Medici by Honore de Balzac: its entrance. The Guises, uncles of Mary Stuart, had powerful reasons
for not residing in Paris and for keeping the king and court in a
castle the whole exterior surroundings of which could easily be
watched and defended. A struggle was now beginning around the throne,
between the house of Lorraine and the house of Valois, which was
destined to end in this very chateau, twenty-eight years later, namely
in 1588, when Henri III., under the very eyes of his mother, at that
moment deeply humiliated by the Lorrains, heard fall upon the floor of
his own cabinet, the head of the boldest of all the Guises, the second
Balafre, son of that first Balafre by whom Catherine de' Medici was
now being tricked, watched, threatened, and virtually imprisoned.
|
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 The Man in Lower Ten by Mary Roberts Rinehart: you see it yourself?"
He was leaning forward, excitedly, and I could almost see the
gruesome tragedy he was depicting.
"She draws out the wallet. Then, perhaps she remembers the alligator
bag, and on the possibility that the notes are there, instead of in
the pocket-book, she gropes around for it. Suddenly, the man awakes
and clutches at the nearest object, perhaps her neck chain, which
breaks. She drops the pocket-book and tries to escape, but he has
caught her right hand.
"It is all in silence; the man is still stupidly drunk. But he
holds her in a tight grip. Then the tragedy. She must get away;
The Man in Lower Ten |
