| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Market-Place by Harold Frederic: Julia, upon even first sight, made a much pleasanter
impression than her mother's hesitating description
had prepared him for. As he came to know her well,
he ceased to remember that there was a question in any mind
as to her being a pretty girl. There was less colour
in her face than he could have wished. Her smooth,
pallid skin, almost waxen in texture, had a suggestion
of delicate health which sometimes troubled him a little,
but which appealed to the tenderness in his nature all
the time. The face was unduly thin, perhaps, but this,
and the wistful glance of the large grey eyes in repose,
The Market-Place |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Divine Comedy (translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) by Dante Alighieri: And if the world below would fix its mind
On the foundation which is laid by nature,
Pursuing that, 'twould have the people good.
But you unto religion wrench aside
Him who was born to gird him with the sword,
And make a king of him who is for sermons;
Therefore your footsteps wander from the road."
Paradiso: Canto IX
Beautiful Clemence, after that thy Charles
Had me enlightened, he narrated to me
The treacheries his seed should undergo;
The Divine Comedy (translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Plutarch's Lives by A. H. Clough: tyrannic passion; nay, among his friends he highly commended the
great mind of Fabricius, and entrusted the prisoners to him alone, on
condition that if the senate should not vote a peace, after they had
conversed with their friends and celebrated the festival of Saturn,
they should be remanded. And, accordingly, they were sent back after
the holidays; it being decreed pain of death for any that stayed
behind.
After this, Fabricius taking the consulate, a person came with a
letter to the camp written by the king's principal physician,
offering to take off Pyrrhus by poison, and so end the war without
further hazard to the Romans, if he might have a reward
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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 King Henry VI by William Shakespeare: There shall I rest secure from force and fraud.
Come therefore, let us fly while we may fly;
If Warwick take us, we are sure to die.
[Exeunt.]
SCENE V. A park near Middleham Castle in Yorkshire
[Enter GLOSTER, HASTINGS, SIR WILLIAM STANLEY, and others.]
GLOSTER.
Now, my Lord Hastings, and Sir William Stanley,
Leave off to wonder why I drew you hither
Into this chiefest thicket of the park.
Thus stands the case: you know our King, my brother,
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