| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Children of the Night by Edwin Arlington Robinson: Wet with a day's blown froth, I noted
That things were still; that the walnut tables,
Where men but a moment before were sitting,
Were gone; that a screen of something around me
Shut them out of my sight. But the gilded
Signs of a hundred beers and whiskeys
Flashed from the walls above, and the mirrors
And glasses behind the bar were lighted
In some strange way, and into my spirit
A thousand shafts of terrible fire
Burned like death, and I fell. The story
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Man of Business by Honore de Balzac: have six hundred and thirty francs fifteen centimes to give you!'
"To his utter consternation, he saw Cerizet, emerged from his
wrappings like a butterfly from the chrysalis, holding out the
accursed bundle of documents.
" 'When I was down on my luck, I learned to act on the stage,' added
Cerizet. 'I am as good as Bouffe at old men.'
" 'I have fallen among thieves!' shouted Maxime.
" 'No, Monsieur le Comte, you are in Mlle. Hortense's house. She is a
friend of old Lord Dudley's; he keeps her hidden away here; but she
has the bad taste to like your humble servant.'
" 'If ever I longed to kill a man,' so the Count told me afterwards,
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Illustrious Gaudissart by Honore de Balzac: "Monsieur has doubtless been in business--?" began Gaudissart.
"Public business," answered Margaritis, interrupting him. "I
pacificated Calabria under the reign of King Murat."
"Bless me! if he hasn't gone to Calabria!" whispered Monsieur Vernier.
"In that case," said Gaudissart, "we shall quickly understand each
other."
"I am listening," said Margaritis, striking the attitude taken by a
man when he poses to a portrait-painter.
"Monsieur," said Gaudissart, who chanced to be turning his watch-key
with a rotatory and periodical click which caught the attention of the
lunatic and contributed no doubt to keep him quiet. "Monsieur, if you
|
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 Letters from England by Elizabeth Davis Bancroft: occasion of the annual meeting of this society for a week at Norwich
that the Bishop has invited us to stay a few days at the palace and
join them in their agreeable antiquarian excursions. We arrived on
Friday at five o'clock after a long dull journey of five hours on
the railway. . . . Staying in the house are our friends, Mr. and
Mrs. Milman, Lord Northampton and his son, Lord Alwyne Compton, and
the Bishop's family, consisting of Mrs. Stanley, and of two Miss
Stanleys, agreeable and highly cultivated girls, and Mr. Arthur
Stanley, the writer of Dr. Arnold's Biography.
After dinner company soon arrived. Among them were Mrs. Opie, who
resides here. She is a pleasing, lively old lady, in full Quaker
|
