| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Gambara by Honore de Balzac: willing listener, took possession of him, and compelled him to listen
to the opera he had written for Paris.
"In the first place, monsieur," said the composer, "allow me to
explain the subject in a few words. Here, the hearers receiving a
musical impression do not work it out in themselves, as religion bids
us work out the texts of Scripture in prayer. Hence it is very
difficult to make them understand that there is in nature an eternal
melody, exquisitely sweet, a perfect harmony, disturbed only by
revolutions independent of the divine will, as passions are
uncontrolled by the will of men.
"I, therefore, had to seek a vast framework in which effect and cause
Gambara |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Happy Prince and Other Tales by Oscar Wilde: up behind him and took him gently in his hand, and put him up into
the tree. And the tree broke at once into blossom, and the birds
came and sang on it, and the little boy stretched out his two arms
and flung them round the Giant's neck, and kissed him. And the
other children, when they saw that the Giant was not wicked any
longer, came running back, and with them came the Spring. "It is
your garden now, little children," said the Giant, and he took a
great axe and knocked down the wall. And when the people were
going to market at twelve o'clock they found the Giant playing with
the children in the most beautiful garden they had ever seen.
All day long they played, and in the evening they came to the Giant
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Alexander's Bridge by Willa Cather: world, certainly, but it was always Alexander's
picture that the Sunday Supplement men wanted,
because he looked as a tamer of rivers
ought to look. Under his tumbled sandy
hair his head seemed as hard and powerful
as a catapult, and his shoulders looked
strong enough in themselves to support
a span of any one of his ten great bridges
that cut the air above as many rivers.
After dinner Alexander took Wilson up to
his study. It was a large room over the
Alexander's Bridge |
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 Monster Men by Edgar Rice Burroughs: the more open pathway between the beach and camp.
4
A NEW FACE
As Professor Maxon and von Horn rushed from the
workshop to their own campong, they neglected, in their
haste, to lock the door between, and for the first time
since the camp was completed it stood unlatched and ajar.
The professor had been engaged in taking careful
measurements of the head of his latest experiment, the
while he coached the young man in the first rudiments
of spoken language, and now the subject of his labors
The Monster Men |
