| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Arrow of Gold by Joseph Conrad: "So be it; but then you must go away yourself. Go now, before it
is too late."
I didn't condescend to answer this. The drumming on the panels
stopped and the absurd thunder of it died out in the house. I
don't know why precisely then I had the acute vision of the red
mouth of Jose Ortega wriggling with rage between his funny
whiskers. He began afresh but in a tired tone:
"Do you expect a fellow to forget your tricks, you wicked little
devil? Haven't you ever seen me dodging about to get a sight of
you amongst those pretty gentlemen, on horseback, like a princess,
with pure cheeks like a carved saint? I wonder I didn't throw
The Arrow of Gold |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Grimm's Fairy Tales by Brothers Grimm: laid his head in her lap and fell asleep; and whilst he was sleeping
on she took the cloak from his shoulders, hung it on her own, picked
up the diamonds, and wished herself home again.
When he awoke and found that his lady had tricked him, and left him
alone on the wild rock, he said, 'Alas! what roguery there is in the
world!' and there he sat in great grief and fear, not knowing what to
do. Now this rock belonged to fierce giants who lived upon it; and as
he saw three of them striding about, he thought to himself, 'I can
only save myself by feigning to be asleep'; so he laid himself down as
if he were in a sound sleep. When the giants came up to him, the first
pushed him with his foot, and said, 'What worm is this that lies here
Grimm's Fairy Tales |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Symposium by Plato: was seeking for an expression of the world around him, the conception of
love greatly affected him. One of the first distinctions of language and
of mythology was that of gender; and at a later period the ancient
physicist, anticipating modern science, saw, or thought that he saw, a sex
in plants; there were elective affinities among the elements, marriages of
earth and heaven. (Aesch. Frag. Dan.) Love became a mythic personage whom
philosophy, borrowing from poetry, converted into an efficient cause of
creation. The traces of the existence of love, as of number and figure,
were everywhere discerned; and in the Pythagorean list of opposites male
and female were ranged side by side with odd and even, finite and infinite.
But Plato seems also to be aware that there is a mystery of love in man as
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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 Tom Sawyer Abroad by Mark Twain: to show what he could do, and then he would sink it in
the sea, and sink us all along with it, too. Well, it was
the awfulest fix to be in, and here was night coming
on!
He give us something to eat, and made us go to the
other end of the boat, and he laid down on a locker,
where he could boss all the works, and put his old
pepper-box revolver under his head, and said if any-
body come fooling around there trying to land her, he
would kill him.
We set scrunched up together, and thought consider-
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