| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Message by Honore de Balzac: everything."
"What calm!" I said to myself as I saw the ghastly pallor of her
face contrasting with her brown hair, and heard the guttural
tones of her voice. The havoc wrought in her drawn features
filled me with dumb amazement.
Those few hours had bleached her; she had lost a woman's last
glow of autumn color. Her eyes were red and swollen, nothing of
their beauty remained, nothing looked out of them save her bitter
and exceeding grief; it was as if a gray cloud covered the place
through which the sun had shone.
I gave her the story of the accident in a few words, without
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Republic by Plato: truth most nearly, and is least likely to be the sport of fantastic and
lawless visions.
I quite agree.
In saying this I have been running into a digression; but the point which I
desire to note is that in all of us, even in good men, there is a lawless
wild-beast nature, which peers out in sleep. Pray, consider whether I am
right, and you agree with me.
Yes, I agree.
And now remember the character which we attributed to the democratic man.
He was supposed from his youth upwards to have been trained under a miserly
parent, who encouraged the saving appetites in him, but discountenanced the
The Republic |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Black Arrow by Robert Louis Stevenson: as looked across his shoulder, he soon thought better of that, and
began to run in turn. But the ground was very difficult and steep;
Dick had already a long start, and had, at any rate, the lighter
heels, and he had long since come to the summit, crawled forward
through the firs, and ensconced himself in a thick tuft of gorse,
before Matcham, panting like a deer, rejoined him, and lay down in
silence by his side.
Below, in the bottom of a considerable valley, the short cut from
Tunstall hamlet wound downwards to the ferry. It was well beaten,
and the eye followed it easily from point to point. Here it was
bordered by open glades; there the forest closed upon it; every
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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 The Secrets of the Princesse de Cadignan by Honore de Balzac: such delightful fetes, now lived in a small apartment of five rooms,--
an antechamber, dining-room, salon, one bed-chamber, and a dressing-
room, with two women-servants only.
"Ah! she is devoted to her son," said that clever creature, Madame
d'Espard, "and devoted without ostentation; she is happy. Who would
ever have believed so frivolous a woman was capable of such persistent
resolution! Our good archbishop has, consequently, greatly encouraged
her; he is most kind to her, and has just induced the old Comtesse de
Cinq-Cygne to pay her a visit."
Let us admit a truth! One must be a queen to know how to abdicate, and
to descend with dignity from a lofty position which is never wholly
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