| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals by Charles Darwin: In like manner the wonderful power which a chicken possesses only a few
hours after being hatched, of picking up small particles of food,
seems to be started into action through the sense of hearing;
for with chickens hatched by artificial heat, a good observer found
that "making a noise with the finger-nail against a board, in imitation
of the hen-mother, first taught them to peck at their meat."[18]
[17] Carpenter, `Principles of Comparative Physiology,' 1854, p. 690, and
Muller's `Elements of Physiology,' Eng. translat. vol. ii. p. 936.
[18] Mowbray on `Poultry,' 6th edit. 1830, p. 54.
I will give only one other instance of an habitual and
purposeless movement. The Sheldrake (_Tadorna_) feeds on the sands
Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals |
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 A Personal Record by Joseph Conrad: brothers rearing their monstrous heads against a brilliant sky,
put his hand on my shoulder affectionately.
"Well! That's enough. We will have no more of it."
And indeed there was no more question of my mysterious vocation
between us. There was to be no more question of it at all, no
where or with any one. We began the descent of the Furca Pass
conversing merrily.
Eleven years later, month for month, I stood on Tower Hill on the
steps of the St. Katherine's Dockhouse, a master in the British
Merchant Service. But the man who put his hand on my shoulder at
the top of the Furca Pass was no longer living.
A Personal Record |
