| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Bureaucracy by Honore de Balzac: amusement the dilemma in which du Bruel had put him by bringing him
the night before Bixiou's amendments to the obituary. He was laughing
to himself as he reread the biography of the late Comte da Fontaine,
dead a few months earlier, which he had hastily substituted for that
of La Billardiere, when his eyes were dazzled by the name of Baudoyer.
He read with fury the article which pledged the minister, and then he
rang violently for Dutocq, to send him at once to the editor. But what
was his astonishment on reading the reply of the opposition paper! The
situation was evidently serious. He knew the game, and he saw that the
man who was shuffling his cards for him was a Greek of the first
order. To dictate in this way through two opposing newspapers in one
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Wife, et al by Anton Chekhov: by her; and I kept trying to understand why she had met him first
and not me, and why such a terrible mistake in our lives need
have happened.
"And when I went to the town I saw every time from her eyes that
she was expecting me, and she would confess to me herself that
she had had a peculiar feeling all that day and had guessed that
I should come. We talked a long time, and were silent, yet we did
not confess our love to each other, but timidly and jealously
concealed it. We were afraid of everything that might reveal our
secret to ourselves. I loved her tenderly, deeply, but I
reflected and kept asking myself what our love could lead to if
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Ballads by Robert Louis Stevenson: The water lips it and crosses in silver trickles at first,
And then, of a sudden, whelms and bears it away forthright:
So now, in a moment, the flame sprang and towered in the night,
And wrestled and roared in the wind, and high over house and tree,
Stood, like a streaming torch, enlightening land and sea.
But the mother of Tamatea threw her arms abroad,
"Pyre of my son," she shouted, 'debited vengeance of God,
Late, late, I behold you, yet I behold you at last,
And glory, beholding! For now are the days of my agony past,
The lust that famished my soul now eats and drinks its desire,
And they that encompassed my son shrivel alive in the fire.
Ballads |
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 Mrs. Warren's Profession by George Bernard Shaw: which is hateful to him. An idea strikes him. He will assault
the duenna, and get ignominiously expelled from the palace by his
indignant father-in-law. To his horror, when he proceeds to
carry out this stratagem, the duenna, far from raising an alarm,
is flattered, delighted, and compliant. The assaulter becomes
the assaulted. He flings her angrily to the ground, where she
remains placidly. He flies. The father enters; dismisses the
duenna; and listens at the keyhole of his daughter's nuptial
chamber, uttering various pleasantries, and declaring, with a
shiver, that a sound of kissing, which he supposes to proceed
from within, makes him feel young again.
|
