| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Across The Plains by Robert Louis Stevenson: had scored a point.
THE COMMISSARY. Why, then, do you travel?
THE ARETHUSA. I travel for pleasure.
THE COMMISSARY (POINTING TO THE KNAPSACK, AND WITH SUBLIME
INCREDULITY). AVEC CA? VOYEZ-VOUS, JE SUIS UN HOMME INTELLIGENT!
(With that? Look here, I am a person of intelligence!)
The culprit remaining silent under this home thrust, the Commissary
relished his triumph for a while, and then demanded (like the
postman, but with what different expectations!) to see the contents
of the knapsack. And here the Arethusa, not yet sufficiently awake
to his position, fell into a grave mistake. There was little or no
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Land of Footprints by Stewart Edward White: They are the conservatives of the world.
Nor must we conclude-looking at them with the eyes of our own
civilization-that the savage is, from his standpoint, lazy and
idle. His life is laid out more rigidly than ours will be for a
great many thousands of years. From childhood to old age he
performs his every act in accord with prohibitions and
requirements. He must remember them all; for ignorance does not
divert consequences. He must observe them all; in pain of
terrible punishments. For example, never may he cultivate on the
site of a grave; and the plants that spring up from it must never
be cut.* He must make certain complicated offerings before
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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 Polity of Athenians and Lacedaemonians by Xenophon: development of comedy at Athens"; Curtius, "H. G." iii. pp. 242,
243; Thirlwall, "H. G." ch. xviii. vol. iii. p. 42.
[24] Or, more lit. "it would not do for the People to hear," etc.
[25] Or, "the butt of comedy."
What, then, I venture to assert is, that the People of Athens has no
difficulty in recognising which of its citizens are of the better sort
and which the opposite.[26] And so recognising those who are
serviceable and advantageous[27] to itself, even though they be base,
the People loves them; but the good folk they are disposed rather to
hate. This virtue of theirs, the People holds, is not engrained in
their nature for any good to itself, but rather for its injury. In
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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 The Goodness of St. Rocque and Other Stories by Alice Dunbar: coal into infinitesimal portions, or do her housework; but the
knitting was snatched with avidity at the first spare moment, and
the worn, white, blue-marked fingers, half enclosed in kid-glove
stalls for protection, would writhe and twist in and out again.
Little girls just learning to crochet borrowed their patterns
from Tony's wife, and it was considered quite a mark of
advancement to have her inspect a bit of lace done by eager,
chubby fingers. The ladies in larger houses, whose husbands
would be millionaires some day, bought her lace, and gave it to
their servants for Christmas presents.
As for Tony, when she was slow in opening his oysters or in
The Goodness of St. Rocque and Other Stories |
