| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Lady Windermere's Fan by Oscar Wilde: coloured women have dreadful tempers. Do you know, I think I'll
dance with you first, Windermere. [LORD WINDERMERE bits his lip
and frowns.] It will make Lord Augustus so jealous! Lord
Augustus! [LORD AUGUSTUS comes down.] Lord Windermere insists on
my dancing with him first, and, as it's his own house, I can't well
refuse. You know I would much sooner dance with you.
LORD AUGUSTUS. [With a low bow.] I wish I could think so, Mrs.
Erlynne.
MRS ERLYNNE. You know it far too well. I can fancy a person
dancing through life with you and finding it charming.
LORD AUGUSTUS. [Placing his hand on his white waistcoat.] Oh,
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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 Turn of the Screw by Henry James: of what I already liked Mrs. Grose herself for, the pleasure I
could see her feel in my admiration and wonder as I sat at supper
with four tall candles and with my pupil, in a high chair and
a bib, brightly facing me, between them, over bread and milk.
There were naturally things that in Flora's presence could
pass between us only as prodigious and gratified looks,
obscure and roundabout allusions.
"And the little boy--does he look like her? Is he too so very remarkable?"
One wouldn't flatter a child. "Oh, miss, MOST remarkable.
If you think well of this one!"--and she stood there with a plate
in her hand, beaming at our companion, who looked from one of us
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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 Lesser Hippias by Plato: his will to remain and rescue the army in their misfortune. But when
Odysseus speaks falsely he is voluntarily and intentionally false.
SOCRATES: You, sweet Hippias, like Odysseus, are a deceiver yourself.
HIPPIAS: Certainly not, Socrates; what makes you say so?
SOCRATES: Because you say that Achilles does not speak falsely from
design, when he is not only a deceiver, but besides being a braggart, in
Homer's description of him is so cunning, and so far superior to Odysseus
in lying and pretending, that he dares to contradict himself, and Odysseus
does not find him out; at any rate he does not appear to say anything to
him which would imply that he perceived his falsehood.
HIPPIAS: What do you mean, Socrates?
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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 The Jolly Corner by Henry James: house he would nevertheless cherish this one; and he dwelt,
further, while they lingered and wandered, on the fact of the
stupefaction he was already exciting, the positive mystification he
felt himself create.
He spoke of the value of all he read into it, into the mere sight
of the walls, mere shapes of the rooms, mere sound of the floors,
mere feel, in his hand, of the old silver-plated knobs of the
several mahogany doors, which suggested the pressure of the palms
of the dead the seventy years of the past in fine that these things
represented, the annals of nearly three generations, counting his
grandfather's, the one that had ended there, and the impalpable
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