| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde: thing.
ALGERNON. Quite so. So I know my constitution can stand it. If
you are not quite sure about your ever having been christened, I
must say I think it rather dangerous your venturing on it now. It
might make you very unwell. You can hardly have forgotten that
some one very closely connected with you was very nearly carried
off this week in Paris by a severe chill.
JACK. Yes, but you said yourself that a severe chill was not
hereditary.
ALGERNON. It usen't to be, I know - but I daresay it is now.
Science is always making wonderful improvements in things.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Walking by Henry David Thoreau: of them, says that "the species of large trees are much more
numerous in North America than in Europe; in the United States
there are more than one hundred and forty species that exceed
thirty feet in height; in France there are but thirty that attain
this size." Later botanists more than confirm his observations.
Humboldt came to America to realize his youthful dreams of a
tropical vegetation, and he beheld it in its greatest perfection
in the primitive forests of the Amazon, the most gigantic
wilderness on the earth, which he has so eloquently described.
The geographer Guyot, himself a European, goes farther--farther
than I am ready to follow him; yet not when he says: "As the
Walking |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Complete Angler by Izaak Walton: garden-worm, or rather two, which you are to fish with in a stream
where the waters run somewhat quietly, for in a stream the bait will not
be so well discerned. I say, in a quiet or dead place, near to some swift,
there draw your bait over the top of the water, to and fro, and if there be
a good Trout in the hole, he will take it, especially if the night be dark,
for then he is bold, and lies near the top of the water, watching the
motion of any frog or water-rat, or mouse, that swims betwixt him and
the sky; these he hunts after, if he sees the water but wrinkle or move in
one of these dead holes, where these great old Trouts usually lie, near
to their holds; for you are to note, that the great old Trout is both subtle
and fearful, and lies close all day, and does not usually stir out of his
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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 Dreams by Olive Schreiner: I said to God, "What lies there?"
He said, "A vine truss, bruised in the wine-press!"
And at the head of the grave stood a cross, and on its foot lay a crown of
thorns.
And as I turned to go, I looked backward. The wine-press and the banquet-
house were gone; but the grave yet stood.
And when I came to the edge of a long ridge there opened out before me a
wide plain of sand. And when I looked downward I saw great stones lie
shattered; and the desert sand had half covered them over.
I said to God, "There is writing on them, but I cannot read it."
And God blew aside the desert sand, and I read the writing: "Weighed in
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