| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Father Goriot by Honore de Balzac: applause, followed by peals of laughter.
"Bravo, Poiret!"
"Who would have thought it of old Poiret!"
"Apollo Poiret!"
"Mars Poiret!"
"Intrepid Poiret!"
A messenger came in at that moment with a letter for Mme.
Vauquer, who read it through, and collapsed in her chair.
"The house might as well be burned down at once," cried she, "if
there are to be any more of these thunderbolts! Young Taillefer
died at three o'clock this afternoon. It serves me right for
Father Goriot |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Shakespeare's Sonnets by William Shakespeare: Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark,
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me prov'd,
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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 Cromwell by William Shakespeare: And here I speak with a presaging soul,
To build a palace where now this cottage stands,
As fine as is King Henry's house at Sheene.
OLD CROMWELL.
You build a house! you knave, you'll be a beggar.
Now, afore God, all is but cast away,
That is bestowed upon this thriftless lad.
Well, had I bound him to some honest trade,
This had not been, but it was his mother's doing,
To send him to the University.
How? build a house where now this cottage stands,
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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 Moby Dick by Herman Melville: frantic impudence.
At last, stepping on board the Pequod, we found everything in
profound quiet, not a soul moving. The cabin entrance was locked
within; the hatches were all on, and lumbered with coils of rigging.
Going forward to the forecastle, we found the slide of the scuttle
open. Seeing a light, we went down, and found only an old rigger
there, wrapped in a tattered pea-jacket. He was thrown at whole
length upon two chests, his face downwards and inclosed in his folded
arms. The profoundest slumber slept upon him.
"Those sailors we saw, Queequeg, where can they have gone to?" said
I, looking dubiously at the sleeper. But it seemed that, when on the
Moby Dick |
