| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Les Miserables by Victor Hugo: Sometimes, in the very obscurity of a fact lurks its danger.
It is obscure because it is underhand. Of all these writers,
the one who probably then excavated in the masses the most unhealthy
gallery was Restif de La Bretonne.
This work, peculiar to the whole of Europe, effected more ravages
in Germany than anywhere else. In Germany, during a given period,
summed up by Schiller in his famous drama The Robbers, theft and pillage
rose up in protest against property and labor, assimilated certain
specious and false elementary ideas, which, though just in appearance,
were absurd in reality, enveloped themselves in these ideas,
disappeared within them, after a fashion, assumed an abstract name,
Les Miserables |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Baby Mine by Margaret Mayo: "Yes?" answered Aggie sweetly, and she crossed to the door and
waited.
"Hasn't he come yet?" called Alfred impatiently.
"Not yet, Alfred," said Aggie, and she closed the door very
softly, lest Alfred should hear her.
"I never knew Alfred could be so silly!" snapped Zoie.
"Sh! sh!" warned Aggie, and she glanced anxiously toward Alfred's
door.
"He doesn't care a bit about me!" complained Zoie. "It's all
that horrid old baby that he's never seen.,'
"If Jimmy doesn't come soon, he never WILL see it," declared
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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 The Gentle Grafter by O. Henry: French /chef/.
So at twelve o'clock we had a hot lunch ready that looked like a
banquet on a Mississippi River steamboat. We spread it on the tops of
two or three big boxes, opened two quarts of the red wine, set the
olives and a canned oyster cocktail and a ready-made Martini by the
colonel's plate, and called him to grub.
Colonel Rockingham drew up his campstool, wiped off his specs, and
looked at the things on the table. Then I thought he was swearing; and
I felt mean because I hadn't taken more pains with the victuals. But
he wasn't; he was asking a blessing; and me and Caligula hung our
heads, and I saw a tear drop from the colonel's eye into his cocktail.
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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 Sportsman by Xenophon: rest," etc.
[16] {ormous}. Lit. "moorings," i.e. "favourite haunts." Cf. {dusorma}
below. Al. "stelle die Fallnetze auf die Wechsel," Lenz.
[17] {anteridas}. See a note in the "Class. Rev." X. i. p. 7, by G. S.
Sale: "It can only mean long sticks used as stretchers or
spreaders to hold up the net between and beyond the props." Cf.
Thuc. vii. 36, 2.
[18] Or, "within the bay of network."
[19] {sunekhontai en tois psilois ai e}. "Denn diese werden an
unbestandenen Orten durch die Leine niedergezogen," Lenz;
{sunelkontai} conj. Schn.; {sunerkhontai} al., "concurrunt," vid.
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