| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Gobseck by Honore de Balzac: torn to rags lie strewn about among the nauseous-looking remnants of
food on the dishes. There is an uproar that stuns you, jesting toasts,
a fire of witticisms and bad jokes; faces are empurpled, eyes inflamed
and expressionless, unintentional confidences tell you the whole
truth. Bottles are smashed, and songs trolled out in the height of a
diabolical racket; men call each other out, hang on each other's
necks, or fall to fisticuffs; the room is full of a horrid, close
scent made up of a hundred odors, and noise enough for a hundred
voices. No one has any notion of what he is eating or drinking or
saying. Some are depressed, others babble, one will turn monomaniac,
repeating the same word over and over again like a bell set jangling;
Gobseck |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Koran: boils--it will well-nigh burst for rage!
Whenever a troop of them is thrown in, its treasurers shall ask
them, 'Did not a warner come to you?'
They shall say, 'Yea! a warner came to us, and we called him liar,
and said, "God has not sent down aught; ye are but in great error!"'
And they shall say, 'Had we but listened or had sense we had not
been amongst the fellows of the blaze!'
And they will confess their sins; but 'Avaunt to the fellows of
the blaze!'
Verily, those who fear their Lord in secret, for them is forgiveness
and a great hire!
The Koran |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen: their heart, and then it made one shudder, for their heart became like a lump
of ice. Some of the broken pieces were so large that they were used for
windowpanes, through which one could not see one's friends. Other pieces were
put in spectacles; and that was a sad affair when people put on their glasses
to see well and rightly. Then the wicked sprite laughed till he almost choked,
for all this tickled his fancy. The fine splinters still flew about in the
air: and now we shall hear what happened next.
SECOND STORY. A Little Boy and a Little Girl
In a large town, where there are so many houses, and so many people, that
there is no roof left for everybody to have a little garden; and where, on
this account, most. persons are obliged to content themselves with flowers in
Fairy Tales |
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 Yates Pride by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman: When Lawton presented her with the roses she pinned one in the
yellowed lace which draped her bodice and put the rest in a great
china vase on the table. The roses were very fragrant, and
immediately the whole room was possessed by them.
A tiny, insistent cry came from a corner, and Lawton and Eudora
turned toward it. There stood the old wooden cradle in which
Eudora had been rocked to sleep, but over the clumsy hood Eudora
had tacked a fall of rich old lace and a great bow of soft pink
satin.
"He is waking up," said the man, in a hushed, almost reverent
voice.
|
