| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Lucile by Owen Meredith: I wish that you knew, sir, how salt is the bread
Of another--(what is it that Dante has said?)
And the trouble of other men's stairs. In a word,
I wish fate had some real affliction conferr'd
On your whimsical self, that, at least, you had cause
For neglecting life's duties, and damning its laws!
This pressure against all the purpose of life,
This self-ebullition, and ferment, and strife,
Betoken'd, I grant that it may be in truth,
The richness and strength of the new wine of youth.
But if, when the wine should have mellow'd with time,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Cromwell by William Shakespeare: For by those men, the Fox of this same land,
That makes a Goose of better than himself,
We'll worry him unto his latest home,
Or Gardiner will fail in his intent.
As for the Dukes of Suffolk and Norfolk,
Whom I have sent for to come speak with me,
Howsoever, outwardly they shadow it,
Yet in their hearts I know they love him not:
As for the Earl of Bedford, he is but one,
And dares not gainsay what we do set down.
[Enter the two witnesses.]
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Four Arthurian Romances by Chretien DeTroyes: who it can be who has struck him. Then face to face with the
other knight, he said: "Vassal, tell me why you have struck me,
when I was not aware of your presence, and when I had done you no
harm." "Upon my word, you had wronged me," the other says: "did
you not treat me disdainfully when I forbade you three times to
cross the ford, shouting at you as loudly as I could? You surely
heard me challenge you at least two or three times, and you
entered in spite of me, though I told you I should strike you as
soon as I saw you in the ford." Then the knight replies to him:
"Whoever heard you or saw you, let him be damned, so far as I am
concerned. I was probably deep in thought when you forbade me to
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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 A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare: Dem. My Lord, faire Helen told me of their stealth,
Of this their purpose hither, to this wood,
And I in furie hither followed them;
Faire Helena, in fancy followed me.
But my good Lord, I wot not by what not by what power,
(But by some power it is) my loue
To Hermia (melted as the snow)
Seems to me now as the remembrance of an idle gaude,
Which in my childehood I did doat vpon:
And all the faith, the vertue of my heart,
The obiect and the pleasure of mine eye,
A Midsummer Night's Dream |
