| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf: sisters, and she would see to it that they didn't laugh at him any more;
she would tell Prue about it. What he would have liked, she supposed,
would have been to say how he had gone not to the circus but to Ibsen with
the Ramsays. He was an awful prig--oh yes, an insufferable bore. For,
though they had reached the town now and were in the main street, with
carts grinding past on the cobbles, still he went on talking, about
settlements, and teaching, and working men, and helping our own class,
and lectures, till she gathered that he had got back entire
self-confidence, had recovered from the circus, and was about (and now
again she liked him away on both sides, they came out on the quay, and the
whole bay spread before them and Mrs Ramsay could not help exclaiming,
To the Lighthouse |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Confessio Amantis by John Gower: The hertes thoght which is withinne
Mai schewe, what it wolde mene;
And that is noghwhere elles sene
Of kinde with non other beste.
So scholde he be the more honeste,
To whom god yaf so gret a yifte,
And loke wel that he ne schifte
Hise wordes to no wicked us;
For word the techer of vertus 1520
Is cleped in Philosophie.
Wherof touchende this partie,
Confessio Amantis |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Laches by Plato: willing to trust them if they only professed to be masters of their art,
unless they could show some proof of their skill or excellence in one or
more works.
LACHES: That is true.
SOCRATES: And therefore, Laches and Nicias, as Lysimachus and Melesias, in
their anxiety to improve the minds of their sons, have asked our advice
about them, we too should tell them who our teachers were, if we say that
we have had any, and prove them to be in the first place men of merit and
experienced trainers of the minds of youth and also to have been really our
teachers. Or if any of us says that he has no teacher, but that he has
works of his own to show; then he should point out to them what Athenians
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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 Adieu by Honore de Balzac: ceased to hope; he felt the blood rushing to his heart, and if he
conquered the vertigo that threatened him, it was because he would
rather see his niece living and mad than dead. He hastened up.
"What are you doing?" he said.
"That is for me," replied the colonel, pointing to a pistol already
loaded, which was lying on the bench; "and this is for her," he added,
as he forced the wad into the weapon he held.
The countess was lying on the ground beside him, playing with the
balls.
"Then you do not know," said the doctor, coldly, concealing his
terror, "that in her sleep last night she called you: Philippe!"
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