| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe: the bear upon us, and then ran away; and I called out, "You dog! is
this your making us laugh? Come away, and take your horse, that we
may shoot the creature." He heard me, and cried out, "No shoot, no
shoot; stand still, and you get much laugh:" and as the nimble
creature ran two feet for the bear's one, he turned on a sudden on
one side of us, and seeing a great oak-tree fit for his purpose, he
beckoned to us to follow; and doubling his pace, he got nimbly up
the tree, laying his gun down upon the ground, at about five or six
yards from the bottom of the tree. The bear soon came to the tree,
and we followed at a distance: the first thing he did he stopped at
the gun, smelt at it, but let it lie, and up he scrambles into the
Robinson Crusoe |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Polly of the Circus by Margaret Mayo: Douglas and Mandy were overjoyed to see the colour creeping back
to her cheeks.
She joined the pastor again in his visits to the poor. The women
of the town would often see them passing and would either whisper
to each other, shrug their shoulders, or lift their eyebrows with
smiling insinuations; but Polly and the pastor were too much
absorbed in each other to take much notice of what was going on
about them.
They had not gone for their walk to-day, because Mandy had needed
Polly to help make ready for the social to be held in the Sunday-
school-room to-night.
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Trooper Peter Halket of Mashonaland by Olive Schreiner: today they will be tomorrow!"
This was intended as a joke, and in that hot weather, and in that dull
world, anything was good enough to laugh at: the third man smiled, but the
first speaker remained serious.
"I only know this," he said, "I'd teach these fellows a lesson, if any one
belonging to me had been among the people they left to be murdered here,
while they went gallivanting to the Transvaal. If my mother or sister had
been killed here, I'd have taken a pistol and blown out the brains of the
great Panjandrum, and the little ones after him. Fine administration of a
country, this, to invite people to come in and live here, and then take
every fighting man out of the country on a gold hunting marauding
|
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 My Bondage and My Freedom by Frederick Douglass: which jarred my whole frame, and commanded me to get up. The man
had obtained complete control over me; and if he had commanded me
to do any possible thing, I should, in my then state of mind,
have endeavored to comply. I made an effort to rise, but fell
back in the attempt, before gaining my feet. The brute now gave
me another heavy kick, and again told me to rise. I again tried
to rise, and succeeded in gaining my feet; but upon stooping to
get the tub with which I was feeding the fan, I again staggered
and fell to the ground; and I must have so fallen, had I been
sure that a hundred bullets would have pierced me, as the
consequence. While down, in this sad condition, and perfectly
My Bondage and My Freedom |
