| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Mirror of the Sea by Joseph Conrad: spars, drumming on the sails, pattering on the oilskin coats,
whitening the decks of homeward-bound ships. Faint, ruddy flashes
of lightning flicker in the starlight upon her mastheads. A chilly
blast hums in the taut rigging, causing the ship to tremble to her
very keel, and the soaked men on her decks to shiver in their wet
clothes to the very marrow of their bones. Before one squall has
flown over to sink in the eastern board, the edge of another peeps
up already above the western horizon, racing up swift, shapeless,
like a black bag full of frozen water ready to burst over your
devoted head. The temper of the ruler of the ocean has changed.
Each gust of the clouded mood that seemed warmed by the heat of a
 The Mirror of the Sea |
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 Dream Life and Real Life by Olive Schreiner: game, and care nothing for the hand of his fellow! Each man for himself.
So the game must be played!' and you doubt all you have lived for, and the
ground seems washing out under your feet--." She paused. "Such a time has
come to me now. If you would promise me that if ever another woman comes
to seek your help, you will give it to her, and try to love her for my
sake, I think it will help me. I think I should be able to keep my faith."
"Oh, I will do anything you ask me to. You are so good and great."
"Oh, good and great!--if you knew! Now go, dear."
"I have not kept you from your work, have I?"
"No; I have not been working lately. Good-by, dear."
The younger woman went; and the elder knelt down by the chair, and wailed
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