| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Woman and Labour by Olive Schreiner: them, a world of emotion concentrated on the sightless creatures, and a
whole body of new mental aptitudes brought into play in caring for them, it
is then that between her and the male who begot them, but cares nothing for
them, there does rise a psychic difference that is real and wide. Alike in
the sports of puppydom and the non-sexual activities of adult age; alike in
the possession of the initial sexual instinct which draws the sex to the
sex, the moment active sexual reproduction is concerned, there is opened to
the female a certain world of sensations and experiences, from which her
male companion is for ever excluded.
So also is our human world: alike in the sports, and joys, and sorrows of
infancy; alike in the non-sexual labours of life; alike even in the
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom by William and Ellen Craft: fugitives. They had much rather take the keen and
poisonous lash, and with it cut their poor trembling
victims to atoms, than allow one of them to escape
to a free country, and expose the infamous system
from which he fled.
The greatest excitement prevails at a slave-hunt.
The slaveholders and their hired ruffians appear to
take more pleasure in this inhuman pursuit than
English sportsmen do in chasing a fox or a stag.
Therefore, knowing what we should have been
compelled to suffer, if caught and taken back,
Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving: the master, in the tone of menace or command, or, peradventure,
by the appalling sound of the birch, as he urged some tardy
loiterer along the flowery path of knowledge. Truth to say, he
was a conscientious man, and ever bore in mind the golden maxim,
"Spare the rod and spoil the child." Ichabod Crane's scholars
certainly were not spoiled.
I would not have it imagined, however, that he was one of
those cruel potentates of the school who joy in the smart of
their subjects; on the contrary, he administered justice with
discrimination rather than severity; taking the burden off the
backs of the weak, and laying it on those of the strong. Your
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow |
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 Anthem by Ayn Rand: the Doctors cannot cure Solidarity 9-6347.
And as we all undress at night, in the
dim light of the candles, our brothers are
silent, for they dare not speak the thoughts
of their minds. For all must agree with all,
and they cannot know if their thoughts
are the thoughts of all, and so they fear to
speak. And they are glad when the candles
are blown for the night. But we, Equality
7-2521, look through the window upon
the sky, and there is peace in the sky,
Anthem |
