| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Soul of Man by Oscar Wilde: symbolic. And he who made them, those wonderful quickly-moving
figures, made them for his own pleasure, and has never asked the
public what they wanted, has never cared to know what they wanted,
has never allowed the public to dictate to him or influence him in
any way but has gone on intensifying his own personality, and
producing his own individual work. At first none came to him.
That did not matter. Then the few came to him. That did not
change him. The many have come now. He is still the same. He is
an incomparable novelist. With the decorative arts it is not
different. The public clung with really pathetic tenacity to what
I believe were the direct traditions of the Great Exhibition of
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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 Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy: Ravenswood. That abstracted pedestrian had edged into the
slit by the adroit fillip of his person sideways; from the
slit he edged into the tavern by a similar exercise of
skill.
The company at the Three Mariners were persons of quality in
comparison with the company which gathered here; though it
must be admitted that the lowest fringe of the Mariner's
party touched the crest of Peter's at points. Waifs and
strays of all sorts loitered about here. The landlady was a
virtuous woman who years ago had been unjustly sent to gaol
as an accessory to something or other after the fact. She
The Mayor of Casterbridge |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Damaged Goods by Upton Sinclair: means to us--the hopes we had of that boy! Such a fine fellow he
was, and a good fellow, too, sir! We were so proud of him; we
had bled our veins to keep him in college--and now just see!"
"Don't despair, sir," said the doctor, "we'll try to cure him."
And he added with that same note of sorrow in his voice which
George had heard, "Why did you wait so long before you brought
the boy to me?"
"How was I to know what he had?" cried the other. "He didn't
dare tell me, sir--he was afraid of my scolding him. And in the
meantime the disease was running its course. When he realized
that he had it, he went secretly to one of the quacks, who robbed
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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 Complete Angler by Izaak Walton: ones to the care of the God of nature, who is said, in the Psalms, "to
feed the young ravens that call upon him ". And they be kept alive and
fed by a dew; or worms that breed in their nests; or some other ways
that we mortals know not. And this may be believed of the Fordidge
Trout, which, as it is said of the stork, that he knows his season, so he
knows his times, I think almost his day of coming into that river out of
the sea; where he lives, and, it is like, feeds, nine months of the year,
and fasts three in the river of Fordidge. And you are to note, that those
townsmen are very punctual in observing the time of beginning to fish
for them; and boast much, that their river affords a Trout that exceeds
all others. And just so does Sussex boast of several fish; as, namely, a
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