| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Chouans by Honore de Balzac: space between the door of the hut and the old rotten trunk where seven
men stood, the Gars fired into their midst and sprang forward
instantly, forcing a passage through them. The three troops rushed
towards the opening through which he had passed, and saw him running
across the field with incredible celerity.
"Fire! fire! a thousand devils! You're not Frenchmen! Fire, I say!"
called Hulot.
As he shouted these words from the height above, his men and Gudin's
fired a volley, which was fortunately ill-aimed. The marquis reached
the gate of the next field, but as he did so he was almost caught by
Gudin, who was close upon his heels. The Gars redoubled his speed.
The Chouans |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Adieu by Honore de Balzac: showing the thickness of that miry mask. The filth of their long
beards made these men still more repulsive. Some were wrapped in the
countess's shawls, others wore the trappings of horses and muddy
saddlecloths, or masses of rags from which the hoar-frost hung; some
had a boot on one leg and a shoe on the other; in fact, there were
none whose costume did not present some laughable singularity. But in
presence of such amusing sights the men themselves were grave and
gloomy. The silence was broken only by the snapping of the wood, the
crackling of the flames, the distant murmur of the camps, and the
blows of the sabre given to what remained of Bichette in search of her
tenderest morsels. A few miserable creatures, perhaps more weary than
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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 Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe: all my pistols, and resolved to defend myself to the last gasp -
not forgetting seriously to commend myself to the Divine
protection, and earnestly to pray to God to deliver me out of the
hands of the barbarians. I continued in this posture about two
hours, and began to be impatient for intelligence abroad, for I had
no spies to send out. After sitting a while longer, and musing
what I should do in this case, I was not able to bear sitting in
ignorance longer; so setting up my ladder to the side of the hill,
where there was a flat place, as I observed before, and then
pulling the ladder after me, I set it up again and mounted the top
of the hill, and pulling out my perspective glass, which I had
Robinson Crusoe |
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 Essays of Travel by Robert Louis Stevenson: calling you farther in, and you turn from one side to another, like
Buridan's donkey, in a maze of pleasure.
Comely beeches send up their white, straight, clustered branches,
barred with green moss, like so many fingers from a half-clenched
hand. Mighty oaks stand to the ankles in a fine tracery of
underwood; thence the tall shaft climbs upwards, and the great forest
of stalwart boughs spreads out into the golden evening sky, where the
rooks are flying and calling. On the sward of the Bois d'Hyver the
firs stand well asunder with outspread arms, like fencers saluting;
and the air smells of resin all around, and the sound of the axe is
rarely still. But strangest of all, and in appearance oldest of all,
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