| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton by Edith Wharton: first the roused household could not make out what she was
saying, and thought she had gone suddenly mad. But there, sure
enough, at the top of the stairs lay her husband, stone dead, and
head foremost, the blood from his wounds dripping down to the
steps below him. He had been dreadfully scratched and gashed
about the face and throat, as if with a dull weapon; and one of
his legs had a deep tear in it which had cut an artery, and
probably caused his death. But how did he come there, and who
had murdered him?
His wife declared that she had been asleep in her bed, and
hearing his cry had rushed out to find him lying on the stairs;
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from O Pioneers! by Willa Cather: as the blood in one's heart; and the spring
would come again! Oh, it would come again!
II
If Alexandra had had much imagination she
might have guessed what was going on in
Marie's mind, and she would have seen long
O Pioneers! |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Rig Veda: to win
the light of heaven.
9 Yea, e'en that heaven itself of old bent backward before
thy bolt,
in terror of its anger,
When Indra, life of every living creature, smote down within
his lair
the assailing Dragon.
10 Yea, Strong One! Tvastar turned for thee, the Mighty, the
bolt with
thousand spikes and hundred edges,
The Rig Veda |
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 American Notes by Rudyard Kipling: Washington society, the precise value of Cable's works as
compared with Uncle Remus Harris, and a few other things that had
nothing whatever to do with geysers, but were altogether
pleasant.
Now, an English maiden who had stumbled on a dust-grimed,
lime-washed, sun-peeled, collarless wanderer come from and going
to goodness knows where, would, her mother inciting her and her
father brandishing an umbrella, have regarded him as a dissolute
adventurer--a person to be disregarded.
Not so those delightful people from New Hampshire. They were
good enough to treat him--it sounds almost incredible--as a human
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