| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Gettysburg Address by Abraham Lincoln: dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war. . .testing whether
that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated. . .
can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war.
We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting place
for those who here gave their lives that this nation might live.
It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate. . .we cannot consecrate. . .
we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead,
who struggled here have consecrated it, far above our poor power
to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from End of the Tether by Joseph Conrad: mind had remained as incapable of penetrating the sim-
plest motives of those he served as they themselves were
incapable of detecting through the crust of the earth
the secret nature of its heart, which may be fire or may
be stone. But he had no doubt whatever that the Sofala
was out of the proper track for crossing the bar at
Batu Beru.
It was a slight error. The ship could not have been
more than twice her own length too far to the north-
ward; and a white man at a loss for a cause (since it
was impossible to suspect Captain Whalley of blunder-
End of the Tether |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from A Horse's Tale by Mark Twain: "Well, no, Mongrel, I don't know that it is."
"Why don't you?"
"I've seen a good many human beings in my time. They are created
as they are; they cannot help it. They are only brutal because
that is their make; brutes would be brutal if it was THEIR make."
"To me, Sage-Brush, man is most strange and unaccountable. Why
should he treat dumb animals that way when they are not doing any
harm?"
"Man is not always like that, Mongrel; he is kind enough when he is
not excited by religion."
"Is the bull-fight a religious service?"
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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 A Man of Business by Honore de Balzac: no ill of the poor fellow; he was nabbed; Couture allowed them to
squeeze his cash-box; who would ever have thought it of him?"
"At all events, Cerizet was a low sort of fellow, a good deal damaged
by low debauchery. Now for the duel I spoke about. Never did two
tradesmen of the worst type, with the worst manners, the lowest pair
of villains imaginable, go into partnership in a dirtier business.
Their stock-in-trade consisted of the peculiar idiom of the man about
town, the audacity of poverty, the cunning that comes of experience,
and a special knowledge of Parisian capitalists, their origin,
connections, acquaintances, and intrinsic value. This partnership of
two 'dabblers' (let the Stock Exchange term pass, for it is the only
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