| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from In the Cage by Henry James: at the time she only knew that they presently moved, with
vagueness, yet with continuity, away from the picture of the
lighted vestibule and the quiet stairs and well up the street
together. This also must have been in the absence of a definite
permission, of anything vulgarly articulate, for that matter, on
the part of either; and it was to be, later on, a thing of
remembrance and reflexion for her that the limit of what just here
for a longish minute passed between them was his taking in her
thoroughly successful deprecation, though conveyed without pride or
sound or touch, of the idea that she might be, out of the cage, the
very shop-girl at large that she hugged the theory she wasn't.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Lock and Key Library by Julian Hawthorne, Ed.: escaped unconsciously from between them. At last I could bear it
no longer, and burst forth with the first remark which occurred to
me. We were passing a big, black, queer-shaped stone standing in
rather a lonely uncultivated spot at one end of the garden. It was
an old acquaintance of my childhood; but my thoughts had been
turned towards it now from the fact that I could see it from my
bedroom window, and had been struck afresh by its uncouth,
incongruous appearance.
"Isn't there some story connected with that stone?" I asked. "I
remember that we always called it the Dead Stone as children."
Alan cast a quick, sidelong glance in that direction, and his brows
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Cousin Betty by Honore de Balzac: these three rooms from the rest of the ground floor, and Grindot had
transformed them into an inexpensive private residence. There were two
ways in--from the front, through the shop of a furniture-dealer, to
whom Crevel let it at a low price, and only from month to month, so as
to be able to get rid of him in case of his telling tales, and also
through a door in the wall of the passage, so ingeniously hidden as to
be almost invisible. The little apartment, comprising a dining-room,
drawing-room, and bedroom, all lighted from above, and standing partly
on Crevel's ground and partly on his neighbor's, was very difficult to
find. With the exception of the second-hand furniture-dealer, the
tenants knew nothing of the existence of this little paradise.
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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 Persuasion by Jane Austen: as she might be useful in turning back with her sister, and lessening
the interference in any plan of their own.
"I cannot imagine why they should suppose I should not like a long walk,"
said Mary, as she went up stairs. "Everybody is always supposing
that I am not a good walker; and yet they would not have been pleased,
if we had refused to join them. When people come in this manner
on purpose to ask us, how can one say no?"
Just as they were setting off, the gentlemen returned. They had taken out
a young dog, who had spoilt their sport, and sent them back early.
Their time and strength, and spirits, were, therefore, exactly ready
for this walk, and they entered into it with pleasure. Could Anne
Persuasion |
