| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Arrow of Gold by Joseph Conrad: Because a wild notion had entered a practical old woman's head.
Yes. And the best of it is that I have nothing to complain of.
Had I surrendered I would have been perfectly safe with these two.
It is they or rather he who couldn't trust me, or rather that
something which I express, which I stand for. Mills would never
tell me what it was. Perhaps he didn't know exactly himself. He
said it was something like genius. My genius! Oh, I am not
conscious of it, believe me, I am not conscious of it. But if I
were I wouldn't pluck it out and cast it away. I am ashamed of
nothing, of nothing! Don't be stupid enough to think that I have
the slightest regret. There is no regret. First of all because I
The Arrow of Gold |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from 1984 by George Orwell: had wrenched the loose tooth out by the roots. He tossed it across the
cell.
'You are rotting away,' he said; 'you are falling to pieces. What are you?
A bag of filth. Now turn around and look into that mirror again. Do you
see that thing facing you? That is the last man. If you are human, that is
humanity. Now put your clothes on again.'
Winston began to dress himself with slow stiff movements. Until now he had
not seemed to notice how thin and weak he was. Only one thought stirred in
his mind: that he must have been in this place longer than he had imagined.
Then suddenly as he fixed the miserable rags round himself a feeling of
pity for his ruined body overcame him. Before he knew what he was doing
1984 |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The United States Bill of Rights: III
No soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house,
without the consent of the owner, nor in time of war,
but in a manner to be prescribed by law.
IV
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers,
and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated,
and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath
or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched,
and the persons or things to be seized.
V
|
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 One Basket by Edna Ferber: great deal of soda bicarbonate and tried to fight her fat with
baths. Fifteen or twenty years had worked a startling change in
the two sisters, Flora the beautiful and Sophy the plain. It was
more than a mere physical change. It was a spiritual thing,
though neither knew nor marked it. Each had taken on weight, the
one, solidly, comfortably; the other, flabbily, unhealthily.
With the encroaching fat, Flora's small, delicate features
seemed, somehow, to disappear in her face, so that you saw it as
a large white surface bearing indentations, ridges, and hollows
like one of those enlarged photographs of the moon's surface as
seen through a telescope. A self-centered face, and misleadingly
One Basket |
