| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe: while living, would be seen by me no more.
For several days ensuing, her name was unmentioned by either
Usher or myself: and during this period I was busied in earnest
endeavours to alleviate the melancholy of my friend. We
painted and read together; or I listened, as if in a dream, to
the wild improvisations of his speaking guitar. And thus, as a
closer and still closer intimacy admitted me more unreservedly
into the recesses of his spirit, the more bitterly did I perceive
the futility of all attempt at cheering a mind from which
darkness, as if an inherent positive quality, poured forth upon
all objects of the moral and physical universe, in one unceasing
The Fall of the House of Usher |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare: And heere the maiden sleeping sound,
On the danke and durty ground.
Pretty soule, she durst not lye
Neere this lacke-loue, this kill-curtesie.
Churle, vpon thy eyes I throw
All the power this charme doth owe:
When thou wak'st, let loue forbid
Sleepe his seate on thy eye-lid.
So awake when I am gone:
For I must now to Oberon.
Enter.
A Midsummer Night's Dream |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Albert Savarus by Honore de Balzac: so tender and so susceptible, so vehement and so kind. Therefore, the
judicious mother had encouraged the friendship which bound Leopold to
Rodolphe and Rodolphe to Leopold, since she saw in the cold and
faithful young notary, a guardian, a comrade, who might to a certain
extent take her place if by some misfortune she should be lost to her
son. Rodolphe's mother, still handsome at three-and-forty, had
inspired Leopold with an ardent passion. This circumstance made the
two young men even more intimate.
So Leopold, knowing Rodolphe well, was not surprised to find him
stopping at a village and giving up the projected journey to Saint-
Gothard, on the strength of a single glance at the upper window of a
Albert Savarus |
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: and he led her within a group of trees, the autumn foliage of which
was dropping to the breeze. The colonel sat down. Of her own accord
Stephanie placed herself on his knee. Philippe trembled with joy.
"Love," he said, kissing her hands passionately, "I am Philippe."
She looked at him with curiosity.
"Come," he said, pressing her to him, "dost thou feel my heart? It has
beaten for thee alone. I love thee ever. Philippe is not dead; he is
not dead, thou art on him, in his arms. Thou art MY Stephanie; I am
thy Philippe."
"Adieu," she said, "adieu."
The colonel quivered, for he fancied he saw his own excitement
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