| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Mansion by Henry van Dyke: imagination.
But it was eminently respectable, and in its way imposing.
It seemed to say that the glittering shops of the jewelers, the
milliners,
the confectioners, the florists, the picture-dealers, the
furriers,
the makers of rare and costly antiquities, retail traders in
luxuries of life, were beneath the notice of a house that had its
foundations in the high finance, and was built literally and
figuratively
in the shadow of St. Petronius' Church.
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from 1492 by Mary Johntson: the ships and all the wonders. His was a childlike craving
for pure novelty and marvel.
So we went, all of us, back through vast woodland to
cerulean water. Water was deep, the _Marigalante_ rode close
in, and about and beyond her the _Santa Clara_, the _Cordera_,
the _San Juan_, the _Juana_, another _Nina_, the _Beatrix_ and
many another fair name. They were beautiful, the ships
on the gay water and about them the boats and the red
men's canoes.
We went to the _Marigalante_, I with the Admiral. Dancing
across in the boat there spoke to me Don Diego Colon,
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from A Horse's Tale by Mark Twain: live up to it. It is hard to remember. Will you say it again,
please, and say it slow?"
"Plantigrade circumflex vertebrate bacterium that hasn't any wings
and is uncertain."
"It is beautiful, anybody must grant it; beautiful, and of a noble
sound. I hope it will not make me proud and stuck-up - I should
not like to be that. It is much more distinguished and honorable
to be a reptile than a dog, don't you think, Soldier?"
"Why, there's no comparison. It is awfully aristocratic. Often a
duke is called a reptile; it is set down so, in history."
"Isn't that grand! Potter wouldn't ever associate with me, but I
|
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 Wyoming by William MacLeod Raine: For a long time he lay face down in the grass, his gaze riveted
to the spot where he knew his opponent to be hidden. A faint
rustle not born of the wind stirred the sage. Still Bannister
waited. A less experienced plainsman would have blazed away and
exposed his own position. But not this young man with the
steel-wire nerves. Silent as the coming of dusk, no breaking twig
or displaced brush betrayed his self-contained presence.
Something in the clump he watched wriggled forward and showed
indistinctly through an opening in the underscrub. He whipped his
rifle into position and fired twice. The huddled brown mass
lurched forward and disappeared.
|
