| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Lady Susan by Jane Austen: now an object of indifference to him, and she would be one of contempt were
he to understand her emotions. Her beauty is much admired by the Vernons,
but it has no effect on him. She is in high favour with her aunt
altogether, because she is so little like myself, of course. She is exactly
the companion for Mrs. Vernon, who dearly loves to be firm, and to have
all the sense and all the wit of the conversation to herself: Frederica
will never eclipse her. When she first came I was at some pains to prevent
her seeing much of her aunt; but I have relaxed, as I believe I may depend
on her observing the rules I have laid down for their discourse. But do not
imagine that with all this lenity I have for a moment given up my plan of
her marriage. No; I am unalterably fixed on this point, though I have not
Lady Susan |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Miracle Mongers and Their Methods by Harry Houdini: --FROG-SWALLOWERS: NORTON; ENGLISH
JACK; BOSCO, THE SNAKE-EATER;
BILLINGTON'S PRESCRIPTION FOR
HANGMEN; CAPTAIN VEITRO.--WATER-
SPOUTERS: BLAISE MANFREDE, ca. 1650;
FLORAM MARCHAND, 1650.
That the genesis of stone-eating dates back
hundreds of years farther than is generally
supposed, is shown by a statement in Wanley's
Wonders of the Little World, London, 1906,
Vol. II, page 58, which reads as follows:
Miracle Mongers and Their Methods |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Country Doctor by Honore de Balzac: of an exceedingly wild and extravagant youth. He had retrieved his
position partly by a fortunate marriage, partly by the slow persistent
thrift characteristic of provincial life; for in the provinces people
pride themselves on accumulating rather than on spending, and all the
ambition in a man's nature is either extinguished or directed to
money-getting, for want of any nobler end. So he had grown rich at
last, and thought to transmit to his only son all the cut-and-dried
experience which he himself had purchased at the price of his lost
illusions; a noble last illusion of age which fondly seeks to bequeath
its virtues and its wary prudence to heedless youth, intent only on
the enjoyment of the enchanted life that lies before it.
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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 Symposium by Plato: Potidaea' any more than in a similar salutation when practised by members
of the same family. But those who make these admissions, and who regard,
not without pity, the victims of such illusions in our own day, whose life
has been blasted by them, may be none the less resolved that the natural
and healthy instincts of mankind shall alone be tolerated (Greek); and that
the lesson of manliness which we have inherited from our fathers shall not
degenerate into sentimentalism or effeminacy. The possibility of an
honourable connexion of this kind seems to have died out with Greek
civilization. Among the Romans, and also among barbarians, such as the
Celts and Persians, there is no trace of such attachments existing in any
noble or virtuous form.
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