| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Pool of Blood in the Pastor's Study by Grace Isabel Colbron and Augusta Groner: the cock crowing. I was afraid I might get home here too late and
I forgot the candlesticks. I had to stop to wash my hands in the
brook. While I was there I saw shepherd Janci coming along and I
hid behind the willows. He almost discovered me once, but Janci's
a dreamer, he sees things nobody else sees - and he doesn't see
things that everybody else does see. I couldn't help laughing at
his sleepy face. But I didn't laugh when I came back to the asylum.
Gyuri was waiting for me at the door. When he saw that I hadn't
brought the candlesticks he beat me and tortured me worse than he'd
ever done before."
"And you didn't tell anyone?"
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from She Stoops to Conquer by Oliver Goldsmith: To her a mawkish drab of spurious breed,
Who deals in sentimentals, will succeed!
Poor Ned and I are dead to all intents;
We can as soon speak Greek as sentiments!
Both nervous grown, to keep our spirits up.
We now and then take down a hearty cup.
What shall we do? If Comedy forsake us,
They'll turn us out, and no one else will take us.
But why can't I be moral?--Let me try--
My heart thus pressing--fixed my face and eye--
With a sententious look, that nothing means,
She Stoops to Conquer |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift: thirty-two thousand horse: if that may be called an army, which
is made up of tradesmen in the several cities, and farmers in the
country, whose commanders are only the nobility and gentry,
without pay or reward. They are indeed perfect enough in their
exercises, and under very good discipline, wherein I saw no great
merit; for how should it be otherwise, where every farmer is
under the command of his own landlord, and every citizen under
that of the principal men in his own city, chosen after the
manner of Venice, by ballot?
I have often seen the militia of Lorbrulgrud drawn out to
exercise, in a great field near the city of twenty miles square.
Gulliver's Travels |
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 Master of the World by Jules Verne: the ledge move with the ages slowly up the river, and the tower has
been drawn into the gulf.
The town of Fort Erie stands on the Canadian shore at the entrance of
the river. Two other towns are set along the banks above the falls,
Schlosser on the right bank, and Chippewa on the left, located on
either side of Navy Island. It is at this point that the current,
bound within a narrower channel, begins to move at tremendous speed,
to become two miles further on, the celebrated cataract.
The "Terror" had already passed Fort Erie. The sun in the west
touched the edge of the Canadian horizon, and the moon, faintly seen,
rose above the mists of the south. Darkness would not envelop us for
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