| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Divine Comedy (translated by H.F. Cary) by Dante Alighieri: unnatural act Dante calls his step-son), for the sake of the
treasures which his rapacity had amassed. See Ariosto. Orl. Fur.
c. iii. st 32. He died in 1293 according to Gibbon. Ant. of the
House of Brunswick. Posth. Works, v. ii. 4to.
v. 119. He.] "Henrie, the brother of this Edmund, and son to
the foresaid king of Almaine (Richard, brother of Henry III. of
England) as he returned from Affrike, where he had been with
Prince Edward, was slain at Viterbo in Italy (whither he was come
about business which he had to do with the Pope) by the hand of
Guy de Montfort, the son of Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester,
in revenge of the same Simon's death. The murther was committed
The Divine Comedy (translated by H.F. Cary) |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Kreutzer Sonata by Leo Tolstoy: Just as Ivan was about to sit down to the table Simeon's wife
made a wry face, indicating that she did not like the smell of
Ivan's sheep-skin coat; and turning to her husband she said, "I
shall not sit at the table with a moujik [peasant] who smells
like that."
Simeon the soldier turned to his brother and said: "My lady
objects to the smell of your clothes. You may eat in the
porch."
Ivan said: "Very well, it is all the same to me. I will soon
have to go and feed my horse any way."
Ivan took some bread in one hand, and his kaftan (coat) in the
The Kreutzer Sonata |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Patchwork Girl of Oz by L. Frank Baum: friend, but not being able to shake either his
hands or his feet, which were all occupied in
stirring, he patted the Magician's bald head and
asked: "What?"
"Ah, it's the Silent One," remarked Dr. Pipt,
without looking up, "and he wants to know
what I'm making. Well, when it is quite finished
this compound will be the wonderful Powder
of Life, which no one knows how to make but
myself. Whenever it is sprinkled on anything,
that thing will at once come to life, no matter
The Patchwork Girl of Oz |
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 Maria, or the Wrongs of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft: since happiness was no where to be found.--But of her child,
debilitated by the grief with which its mother had been assailed
before it saw the light, she could not think without an impatient
struggle.
"I, alone, by my active tenderness, could have saved,"
she would exclaim, "from an early blight, this sweet blossom;
and, cherishing it, I should have had something still to love."
In proportion as other expectations were torn from her,
this tender one had been fondly clung to, and knit into her heart.
The books she had obtained, were soon devoured, by one who
had no other resource to escape from sorrow, and the feverish dreams
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