| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Rescue by Joseph Conrad: dark, mourning silently in the manner of white women. She had
made a great outcry in the morning to be allowed to join the
white men on shore. He, Jorgenson, had refused her the canoe.
Ever since she had secluded herself in the deckhouse in great
distress.
Jaffir listened to it all without particular sympathy. And when
Jorgenson added, "It is in my mind, O Jaffir, to let her have her
will now," he answered by a "Yes, by Allah! let her go. What does
it matter?" of the greatest unconcern, till Jorgenson added:
"Yes. And she may carry the ring to the Rajah Laut."
Jorgenson saw Jaffir, the grim and impassive Jaffir, give a
The Rescue |
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: modern languages, and they don't express themselves correctly in
Russian; no longer ago than yesterday my colleague, the professor
of hygiene, complained to me that he had to give twice as many
lectures, because the students had a very poor knowledge of
physics and were utterly ignorant of meteorology. They are
readily carried away by the influence of the last new writers,
even when they are not first-rate, but they take absolutely no
interest in classics such as Shakespeare, Marcus Aurelius,
Epictetus, or Pascal, and this inability to distinguish the great
from the small betrays their ignorance of practical life more
than anything. All difficult questions that have more or less a
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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 An Historical Mystery by Honore de Balzac: Gondreville at liberty."
He ordered the affair to be conducted with the utmost celerity,
regarding it as an attack on his own institutions, a fatal example of
resistance to the results of the Revolution, an effort to open the
great question of the sales of "national property," and a hindrance to
that fusion of parties which was the constant object of his home
policy. Besides all this, he thought himself tricked by these young
nobles, who had given him their promise to live peaceably.
"Fouche's prediction has come true," he cried, remembering the words
uttered two years earlier by his present minister of police, who said
them under the impressions conveyed to him by Corentin's report as to
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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 Egmont by Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe: Carpenter. What such a fellow can say with impunity! Had I said such a
thing, I should not hold myself safe a moment.
Vansen. Do not make yourselves uneasy! God in heaven does not trouble
himself about you, poor worms, much less the Regent.
Jetter. Slanderer!
Vansen. I know some for whom it would be better if, instead of their own
high spirits, they had a little tailor's blood in their veins.
Carpenter. What mean you by that?
Vansen. Hum! I mean the count.
Jetter. Egmont! What has he to fear?
Vansen. I'm a poor devil, and could live a whole year round on what he
Egmont |
