| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Complete Poems of Longfellow by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Both as King Herod and Ben Israel.
Good morrow, Friar!
FRIAR CUTHBERT.
Good morrow, noble Sir!
PRINCE HENRY.
I speak in German, for, unless I err,
You are a German.
FRIAR CUTHBERT.
I cannot gainsay you.
But by what instinct, or what secret sign,
Meeting me here, do you straightway divine
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Astoria by Washington Irving: and cut up by deep and precipitous ravines, extremely toilsome to
the horses. Sometimes the travellers had to follow the course of
some brawling stream, with a broken, rocky bed, which the
shouldering cliffs and promontories on either side obliged them
frequently to cross and recross. For some miles they struggled
forward through these savage and darkly wooded defiles, when all
at once the whole landscape changed, as if by magic. The rude
mountains and rugged ravines softened into beautiful hills, and
intervening meadows, with rivulets winding through fresh herbage,
and sparkling and murmuring over gravelly beds, the whole forming
a verdant and pastoral scene, which derived additional charms
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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 Tono Bungay by H. G. Wells: He shot away out of the shop through some masked door. One heard
his voice. "Susan! Susan!"
Then he reappeared with an extended hand. "Well, how are you?"
he said. "I was never so surprised in my life. Fancy!... You!"
He shook my mother's impassive hand and then mine very warmly
holding his glasses on with his left forefinger.
"Come right in!" he cried--"come right in! Better late than
never!" and led the way into the parlour behind the shop.
After Bladesover that apartment struck me as stuffy and petty,
but it was very comfortable in comparison with the Frapp
living-room. It had a faint, disintegrating smell of meals
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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 Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy: in the time of the Quiet Woman Inn. Grandfer Cantle's
watch had numbered many followers in years gone by,
but since he had grown older faiths were shaken.
Thus, the mummers having gathered hither from scattered
points each came with his own tenets on early and late;
and they waited a little longer as a compromise.
Eustacia had watched the assemblage through the hole;
and seeing that now was the proper moment to enter,
she went from the "linhay" and boldly pulled the bobbin
of the fuelhouse door. Her grandfather was safe at the
Quiet Woman.
Return of the Native |
