| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from End of the Tether by Joseph Conrad: the air, the interlaced boughs, bound and loaded with
creepers, carried on the struggle for life, mingled their
foliage in one solid wall of leaves, with here and there
the shape of an enormous dark pillar soaring, or a
ragged opening, as if torn by the flight of a cannon-
ball, disclosing the impenetrable gloom within, the
secular inviolable shade of the virgin forest. The
thump of the engines reverberated regularly like the
strokes of a metronome beating the measure of the vast
silence, the shadow of the western wall had fallen across
the river, and the smoke pouring backwards from the
End of the Tether |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Gobseck by Honore de Balzac: her all the qualities which, combined, are irresistibly fascinating;
she could be pliant and proud by turns, and confiding and coaxing in
her manner; she even went so far as to try to subjugate me. It was a
failure. As I took my leave of her, I caught a gleam of hate and rage
in her eyes that made me shudder. We parted enemies. She would fain
have crushed me out of existence; and for my own part, I felt pity for
her, and for some natures pity is the deadliest of insults. This
feeling pervaded the last representations I put before her; and when I
left her, I left, I think, dread in the depths of her soul, by
declaring that, turn which way she would, ruin lay inevitably before
her.
Gobseck |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Venus and Adonis by William Shakespeare: And in her haste unfortunately spies
The foul boar's conquest on her fair delight;
Which seen, her eyes, as murder'd with the view,
Like stars asham'd of day, themselves withdrew:
Or, as the snail, whose tender horns being hit, 1033
Shrinks backwards in his shelly cave with pain,
And there, all smother'd up, in shade doth sit,
Long after fearing to creep forth again; 1036
So, at his bloody view, her eyes are fled
Into the deep dark cabills of her head;
Where they resign their office and their light
|
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 Life and Adventures of Santa Claus by L. Frank Baum: not be spared so long as there are children of mankind to miss him and
to grieve over his loss. We immortals are the servants of the world,
and to serve the world we were permitted in the Beginning to exist.
But what one of us is more worthy of immortality than this man Claus,
who so sweetly ministers to the little children?"
He paused and glanced around the circle, to find every immortal
listening to him eagerly and nodding approval. Finally the King of
the Wind Demons, who had been whistling softly to himself, cried out:
"What is your desire, O Ak?"
"To bestow upon Claus the Mantle of Immortality!" said Ak, boldly.
That this demand was wholly unexpected was proved by the immortals
The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus |
