| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Les Miserables by Victor Hugo: presence of the impulses of paladins. Heavy masses, the multitudes
which are fragile because of their very weight, fear adventures;
and there is a touch of adventure in the ideal.
Moreover, and we must not forget this, interests which are not
very friendly to the ideal and the sentimental are in the way.
Sometimes the stomach paralyzes the heart.
The grandeur and beauty of France lies in this, that she takes
less from the stomach than other nations: she more easily knots
the rope about her loins. She is the first awake, the last asleep.
She marches forwards. She is a seeker.
This arises from the fact that she is an artist.
Les Miserables |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Main Street by Sinclair Lewis: The universal sign of winter was the town handyman--
Miles Bjornstam, a tall, thick, red-mustached bachelor, opinionated
atheist, general-store arguer, cynical Santa Claus. Children
loved him, and he sneaked away from work to tell them
improbable stories of sea-faring and horse-trading and bears.
The children's parents either laughed at him or hated him. He
was the one democrat in town. He called both Lyman Cass
the miller and the Finn homesteader from Lost Lake by their
first names. He was known as "The Red Swede," and considered
slightly insane.
Bjornstam could do anything with his hands--solder a pan,
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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 Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe: struggled in vain to reach the remoter angles of the chamber, or
the recesses of the vaulted and fretted ceiling. Dark draperies
hung upon the walls. The general furniture was profuse,
comfortless, antique, and tattered. Many books and musical
instruments lay scattered about, but failed to give any vitality
to the scene. I felt that I breathed an atmosphere of sorrow.
An air of stern, deep, and irredeemable gloom hung over and
pervaded all.
Upon my entrance, Usher rose from a sofa on which he had
been lying at full length, and greeted me with a vivacious warmth
which had much in it, I at first thought, of an overdone
The Fall of the House of Usher |
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 Essays of Travel by Robert Louis Stevenson: and turn to the man's. The walls are shelved waist-high for books,
and the top thus forms a continuous table running round the wall.
Above are prints, a large map of the neighbourhood, a Corot and a
Claude or two. The room is very spacious, and the five tables and
two chairs are but as islands. One table is for actual work, one
close by for references in use; one, very large, for MSS. or proofs
that wait their turn; one kept clear for an occasion; and the fifth
is the map table, groaning under a collection of large-scale maps and
charts. Of all books these are the least wearisome to read and the
richest in matter; the course of roads and rivers, the contour lines
and the forests in the maps - the reefs, soundings, anchors, sailing
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