| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Heap O' Livin' by Edgar A. Guest: Don't imagine you are wasting time for others
that you spend:
You can rise to wealth and glory and still pause
to be a friend.
MY CREED
To live as gently as I can;
To be, no matter where, a man;
To take what comes of good or ill
And cling to faith and honor still;
To do my best, and let that stand
The record of my brain and hand;
A Heap O' Livin' |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Tess of the d'Urbervilles, A Pure Woman by Thomas Hardy: here and there. While slowly breasting this ascent
Tess became conscious of footsteps behind her, and
turning she saw approaching that well-known form--so
strangely accoutred as the Methodist--the one personage
in all the world she wished not to encounter alone on
this side of the grave.
There was not much time, however, for thought or
elusion, and she yielded as calmly as she could to the
necessity of letting him overtake her. She saw that he
was excited, less by the speed of his walk than by the
feelings within him.
Tess of the d'Urbervilles, A Pure Woman |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Alcibiades II by Platonic Imitator: to have one of the things which we mentioned at first, or whether he should
leave you to make your own request:'--what in either case, think you, would
be the best way to take advantage of the opportunity?
ALCIBIADES: Indeed, Socrates, I could not answer you without
consideration. It seems to me to be a wild thing (The Homeric word margos
is said to be here employed in allusion to the quotation from the
'Margites' which Socrates has just made; but it is not used in the sense
which it has in Homer.) to make such a request; a man must be very careful
lest he pray for evil under the idea that he is asking for good, when
shortly after he may have to recall his prayer, and, as you were saying,
demand the opposite of what he at first requested.
|
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 St. Ives by Robert Louis Stevenson: of the PATOIS, too: OUISTREHAM, MATRASSE, and others, the sense of
which we were sometimes unable to guess. On the very last day he
began again his eternal story of the cross and the Emperor. The
Major, who was particularly ill, or at least particularly cross,
uttered some angry words of protest. 'PARDONNEZ-MOI, MONSIEUR LE
COMMANDANT, MAIS C'EST POUR MONSIEUR,' said the Colonel: 'Monsieur
has not yet heard the circumstance, and is good enough to feel an
interest.' Presently after, however, he began to lose the thread
of his narrative; and at last: 'QUE QUE J'AI? JE M'EMBROUILLE!'
says he, 'SUFFIT: S'M'A LA DONNE, ET BERTHE EN ETAIT BIEN
CONTENTE.' It struck me as the falling of the curtain or the
|
