| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Nada the Lily by H. Rider Haggard: and it was dreadful to see her cold and stiff, with not a word to say
however loudly I called to her. Well, they buried my mother, and she
was soon forgotten. I only remembered her, nobody else did--not even
Baleka, for she was too little--and as for my father he took another
young wife and was content. After that I was unhappy, for my brothers
did not love me, because I was much cleverer than they, and had
greater skill with the assegai, and was swifter in running; so they
poisoned the mind of my father against me and he treated me badly. But
Baleka and I loved each other, for we were both lonely, and she clung
to me like a creeper to the only tree in a plain, and though I was
young, I learned this: that to be wise is to be strong, for though he
Nada the Lily |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Give Me Liberty Or Give Me Death by Patrick Henry: struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged
ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest
shall be obtained--we must fight! I repeat it, sir, we must fight!
An appeal to arms and to the God of hosts is all that is left us!
They tell us, sir, that we are weak; unable to cope with so formidable
an adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week,
or the next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a British
guard shall be stationed in every house? Shall we gather strength but
irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance
by lying supinely on our backs and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until
our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot? Sir, we are not weak if we make
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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 The Underground City by Jules Verne: in the Aberfoyle colliery. He was devoted to his trade.
During long years he zealously performed his duty.
His only grief had been to perceive the bed becoming impoverished,
and to see the hour approaching when the seam would be exhausted.
It was then he devoted himself to the search for new veins
in all the Aberfoyle pits, which communicated underground
one with another. He had had the good luck to
discover several during the last period of the working.
His miner's instinct assisted him marvelously, and the engineer,
James Starr, appreciated him highly. It might be said that
he divined the course of seams in the depths of the coal mine
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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 Vailima Letters by Robert Louis Stevenson: unceremoniously off the one shore and driven to try my luck
upon the other - I saw I should have hard enough work to get
my body down, if my mind rested. It was a damnable walk;
certainly not half a mile as the crow flies, but a real
bucketer for hardship. Once I had to pass the stream where
it flowed between banks about three feet high. To get the
easier down, I swung myself by a wild-cocoanut - (so called,
it bears bunches of scarlet nutlets) - which grew upon the
brink. As I so swung, I received a crack on the head that
knocked me all abroad. Impossible to guess what tree had
taken a shy at me. So many towered above, one over the
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