| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Crisis in Russia by Arthur Ransome: ferment of political discussion that filled the first years of the
revolution has died away, and people talk about little but
what they are able to get for dinner, or what somebody else
his been able to get. I, like other foreign visitors coming to
Russia after feeding up in other countries, am all agog to
make people talk. But the sort of questions which interest
me, with my full-fed stomach, are brushed aside almost
fretfully by men who have been more or less hungry for two
or three years on end.
I find, instead of an urgent desire to alter this or that at
once, to-morrow, in the political complexion of the country,
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood by Howard Pyle: As you may have seen two dogs that think to fight, walking slowly
round and round each other, neither cur wishing to begin the combat,
so those two stout yeomen moved slowly around, each watching for a
chance to take the other unaware, and so get in the first blow.
At last Little John struck like a flash, and--"rap!"--the Tanner met
the blow and turned it aside, and then smote back at Little John,
who also turned the blow; and so this mighty battle began.
Then up and down and back and forth they trod, the blows falling
so thick and fast that, at a distance, one would have thought that half
a score of men were fighting. Thus they fought for nigh a half an hour,
until the ground was all plowed up with the digging of their heels,
The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Historical Lecturers and Essays by Charles Kingsley: search of the summer and the sun?
What if the first link in the chain, as yet conceivable by man,
should be the cosmic changes in the distribution of land and water,
which filled the mouths of the Siberian rivers with frozen carcases
of woolly mammoth and rhinoceros; and those again, doubt it not, of
other revolutions, reaching back and back, and on and on, into the
infinite unknown? Why not? For so are all human destinies
Bound with gold chains unto the throne of God.
ANCIENT CIVILISATION {5} {6}
There is a theory abroad in the world just now about the origin of
the human race, which has so many patent and powerful physiological
|
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 The Altar of the Dead by Henry James: from dying to, for actuality, for continuity, for the certainty of
human remembrance.
By this time he had survived all his friends; the last straight
flame was three years old, there was no one to add to the list.
Over and over he called his roll, and it appeared to him compact
and complete. Where should he put in another, where, if there were
no other objection, would it stand in its place in the rank? He
reflected, with a want of sincerity of which he was quite
conscious, that it would be difficult to determine that place.
More and more, besides, face to face with his little legion, over
endless histories, handling the empty shells and playing with the
|
