| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Wrecker by Stevenson & Osbourne: never (up to that day) been honoured with the least approval.
"And your room?" asked Myner.
"O, my room is all right, I think," said I. "She is a very good
old lady, and has never even mentioned her bill."
"Because she is a very good old lady, I don't see why she
should be fined," observed Myner.
"What do you mean by that?" I cried.
"I mean this," said he. "The French give a great deal of credit
amongst themselves; they find it pays on the whole, or the
system would hardly be continued; but I can't see where WE
come in; I can't see that it's honest of us Anglo-Saxons to profit
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx: the union of the bourgeoisie, which class, in order to attain its
own political ends, is compelled to set the whole proletariat in
motion, and is moreover yet, for a time, able to do so. At this
stage, therefore, the proletarians do not fight their enemies,
but the enemies of their enemies, the remnants of absolute
monarchy, the landowners, the non-industrial bourgeois, the petty
bourgeoisie. Thus the whole historical movement is concentrated
in the hands of the bourgeoisie; every victory so obtained is a
victory for the bourgeoisie.
But with the development of industry the proletariat not only
increases in number; it becomes concentrated in greater masses,
The Communist Manifesto |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Tin Woodman of Oz by L. Frank Baum: brains are working finely today, you must admit. Why
not transform Toto into Woot the Wanderer, and then
have them exchange forms? The dog would become a green
monkey and the monkey would have his own natural shape
again."
"To be sure!" cried Jinjur. "That's a fine idea."
"Leave me out of it," said Toto. "I won't do it."
"Wouldn't you be willing to become a green monkey --
see what a pretty color it is -- so that this poor boy
could be restored to his own shape?" asked Jinjur,
pleadingly
The Tin Woodman of Oz |
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 Christ in Flanders by Honore de Balzac: every nerve. The bones of her face showed plainly through the sallow,
almost olive-tinted wrinkles of the skin. The shrunken, ice-cold old
woman wore a black robe, which she trailed in the dust, and at her
throat there was something white, which I dared not examine. I could
scarcely see her wan and colorless eyes, for they were fixed in a
stare upon the heavens. She drew me after her along the aisles,
leaving a trace of her presence in the ashes that she shook from her
dress. Her bones rattled as she walked, like the bones of a skeleton;
and as we went I heard behind me the tinkling of a little bell, a
thin, sharp sound that rang through my head like the notes of a
harmonica.
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