| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Profits of Religion by Upton Sinclair: Blougram told it first
It could not owe a farthing,--not to him
More than St. Paul!
So the bishop goes on with his role, but uneasily conscious of
the contempt of intellectual people.
I pine among my million imbeciles
(You think) aware some dozen men of sense
Eye me and know me, whether I believe
In the last winking virgin as I vow,
And am a fool, or disbelieve in her,
And am a knave.
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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 Voice of the City by O. Henry: had dispersed. They were true Rubberers. People
who leave the scene of an accident with the ambulance
have not genuine caoutchouc in the cosmogony of
their necks. The delicate, fine flavor of the affair is
to be bad only in the after-taste - in gloating over
the spot, in gazing fixedly at the houses opposite, in
hovering there in a dream more exquisite than the
opium-eater's ecstasy. William Pry and Violet Sey-
mour were connoisseurs in casualties. They knew bow
to extract full enjoyment from every incident.
Presently they looked at each other. Violet had a
The Voice of the City |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Enemies of Books by William Blades: in those husks of hemp and flax, which have passed through so
many scourings, washings, dressings, and dryings as the parts
of old paper necessarily have suffer'd. And, indeed, when I
consider what a heap of sawdust or chips this little creature
(which is one of the teeth of Time) conveys into its intrals,
I cannot chuse but remember and admire the excellent contrivance
of Nature in placing in animals such a fire, as is continually
nourished and supply'd by the materials convey'd into the stomach
and fomented by the bellows of the lungs." The picture or "image,"
which accompanies this description, is wonderful to behold.
Certainly R. Hooke, Fellow of the Royal Society, drew somewhat
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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 At the Sign of the Cat & Racket by Honore de Balzac: children." Augustine was little, or, to describe her more truly,
delicately made. Full of gracious candor, a man of the world could
have found no fault in the charming girl beyond a certain meanness of
gesture or vulgarity of attitude, and sometimes a want of ease. Her
silent and placid face was full of the transient melancholy which
comes over all young girls who are too weak to dare to resist their
mother's will.
The two sisters, always plainly dressed, could not gratify the innate
vanity of womanhood but by a luxury of cleanliness which became them
wonderfully, and made them harmonize with the polished counters and
the shining shelves, on which the old man-servant never left a speck
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