| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The New Machiavelli by H. G. Wells: we wore. Our simple verdict on existing arrangements was that they
were "all wrong." The rich were robbers and knew it, kings and
princes were usurpers and knew it, religious teachers were impostors
in league with power, the economic system was an elaborate plot on
the part of the few to expropriate the many. We went about feeling
scornful of all the current forms of life, forms that esteemed
themselves solid, that were, we knew, no more than shapes painted on
a curtain that was presently to be torn aside. . . .
It was Hatherleigh's poster and his capacity for overstating things,
I think, that first qualified my simple revolutionary enthusiasm.
Perhaps also I had met with Fabian publications, but if I did I
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Lemorne Versus Huell by Elizabeth Drew Stoddard: bathers near, I discovered the beauty of the sea, and that I loved
it.
Presently I heard the steps of a horse, and, to my astonishment,
Mr. Uxbridge rode past. I was glad he did not know me. I watched
him as he rode slowly down the road, deep in thought. He let drop
the bridle, and the horse stopped, as if accustomed to the
circumstance, and pawed the ground gently, or yawed his neck for
pastime. Mr. Uxbridge folded his arms and raised his head to look
seaward. It seemed to me as if he were about to address the jury.
I had dropped so entirely from my observance of the landscape that
I jumped when he resumed the bridle and turned his horse to come
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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 Gambara by Honore de Balzac: way.
"You clung to your really magnanimous task as Paolo clung to his
chimera. If you had had nothing but a devotion to duty to guide and
sustain you, triumph might have seemed easier; you would only have had
to crush your heart, and transfer your life into the world of
abstractions; religion would have absorbed all else, and you would
have lived for an idea, like those saintly women who kill all the
instincts of nature at the foot of the altar. But the all-pervading
charm of Paolo, the loftiness of his mind, his rare and touching
proofs of tenderness, constantly drag you down from that ideal realm
where virtue would fain maintain you; they perennially revive in you
Gambara |
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 Z. Marcas by Honore de Balzac: myself to be duped; for I should be to blame, not you."
Then we heard the humblest entreaties, the most fervent adjuration,
not to deprive the country of such superior talents. The man spoke of
patriotism, and Marcas uttered a significant "/Ouh! ouh!/" He laughed
at his would-be patron. Then the statesman was more explicit; he bowed
to the superiority of his erewhile counselor; he pledged himself to
enable Marcas to remain in office, to be elected deputy; then he
offered him a high appointment, promising him that he, the speaker,
would thenceforth be the subordinate of a man whose subaltern he was
only worthy to be. He was in the newly-formed ministry, and he would
not return to power unless Marcas had a post in proportion to his
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