| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Massimilla Doni by Honore de Balzac: repeated in triple time--a monotonous rhythm of gloomy musical
emphasis--and so persistent as to be quite overpowering. The horror of
the Egyptians at the torrent of fire, the cries of vengeance from the
Hebrews, needed a delicate balance of masses; so note how he has made
the development of the orchestral parts follow that of the chorus. The
/allegro assai/ in C minor is terrible in the midst of that deluge of
fire.
"Confess now," said Massimilla, at the moment when Moses, lifting his
rod, brings down the rain of fire, and when the composer puts forth
all his powers in the orchestra and on the stage, "that no music ever
more perfectly expressed the idea of distress and confusion."
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Of The Nature of Things by Lucretius: Produce the fire and which, by order changed,
Do change the nature of the thing produced,
And are thereafter nothing like to fire
Nor whatso else has power to send its bodies
With impact touching on the senses' touch.
Again, to say that all things are but fire
And no true thing in number of all things
Exists but fire, as this same fellow says,
Seems crazed folly. For the man himself
Against the senses by the senses fights,
And hews at that through which is all belief,
Of The Nature of Things |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from On the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin: Malpighiaceae, bear perfect and degraded flowers; in the latter, as A. de
Jussieu has remarked, 'the greater number of the characters proper to the
species, to the genus, to the family, to the class, disappear, and thus
laugh at our classification.' But when Aspicarpa produced in France,
during several years, only degraded flowers, departing so wonderfully in a
number of the most important points of structure from the proper type of
the order, yet M. Richard sagaciously saw, as Jussieu observes, that this
genus should still be retained amongst the Malpighiaceae. This case seems
to me well to illustrate the spirit with which our classifications are
sometimes necessarily founded.
Practically when naturalists are at work, they do not trouble themselves
On the Origin of Species |
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 Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce: attended at different times by seven doctors.
YOKE, n. An implement, madam, to whose Latin name, _jugum_, we owe
one of the most illuminating words in our language -- a word that
defines the matrimonial situation with precision, point and poignancy.
A thousand apologies for withholding it.
YOUTH, n. The Period of Possibility, when Archimedes finds a fulcrum,
Cassandra has a following and seven cities compete for the honor of
endowing a living Homer.
Youth is the true Saturnian Reign, the Golden Age on earth
again, when figs are grown on thistles, and pigs betailed with
whistles and, wearing silken bristles, live ever in clover, and
The Devil's Dictionary |
