| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Shadow Line by Joseph Conrad: added: "I am all right now," quickly, between the
tell-tale gasps.
I could neither hear nor see anybody else; but
when I spoke up, answering sad murmurs filled the
quarter-deck, and its shadows seemed to shift here
and there. I ordered all the halyards laid down on
deck clear for running.
"I'll see to that, sir," volunteered Ransome in
his natural, pleasant tone, which comforted one
and aroused one's compassion, too, somehow.
That man ought to have been in his bed, resting,
The Shadow Line |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Elixir of Life by Honore de Balzac: alone knows the number of those who are parricides in thought.
Picture to yourself the state of mind of a man who must pay a
life annuity to some old woman whom he scarcely knows; both live
in the country with a brook between them, both sides are free to
hate cordially, without offending against the social conventions
that require two brothers to wear a mask if the older will
succeed to the entail, and the other to the fortune of a younger
son. The whole civilization of Europe turns upon the principle of
hereditary succession as upon a pivot; it would be madness to
subvert the principle; but could we not, in an age that prides
itself upon its mechanical inventions, perfect this essential
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