| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Island Nights' Entertainments by Robert Louis Stevenson: you to frighten me again," I says, and slipped down the tree, and
set out again to find my enemy's head office, which I guessed would
not be far away.
The undergrowth was thick in this part; I couldn't see before my
nose, and must burst my way through by main force and ply the knife
as I went, slicing the cords of the lianas and slashing down whole
trees at a blow. I call them trees for the bigness, but in truth
they were just big weeds, and sappy to cut through like carrot.
From all this crowd and kind of vegetation, I was just thinking to
myself, the place might have once been cleared, when I came on my
nose over a pile of stones, and saw in a moment it was some kind of
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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 Light of Western Stars by Zane Grey: Monty Price had understood it. Link was the lightning-forged
automaton, the driving, relentless, unconquerable instrument of a
woman's will. He was a man whose force was directed by a woman's
passion. He reached up to her height, felt her love, understood
the nature of her agony. These made him heroic. But it was the
hard life, the wild years of danger on the desert, the
companionship of ruthless men, the elemental, that made possible
his physical achievement. Madeline loved his spirit then and
gloried in the man.
She had pictured upon her heart, never to be forgotten, this
little hunched, deformed figure of Link's hanging with dauntless,
The Light of Western Stars |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from An Ideal Husband by Oscar Wilde: expression in the deep-set eyes. The variance is suggestive of an
almost complete separation of passion and intellect, as though
thought and emotion were each isolated in its own sphere through some
violence of will-power. There is nervousness in the nostrils, and in
the pale, thin, pointed hands. It would be inaccurate to call him
picturesque. Picturesqueness cannot survive the House of Commons.
But Vandyck would have liked to have painted his head.]
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Good evening, Lady Markby! I hope you have
brought Sir John with you?
LADY MARKBY. Oh! I have brought a much more charming person than
Sir John. Sir John's temper since he has taken seriously to politics
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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 On Revenues by Xenophon: galleries. To open cuttings in new directions to-day is just as
possible as it was in former times. In fact no one can take on himself
to say whether there is more ore in the regions already cut into, or
in those where the pick has not yet struck.[33] Well then, it may be
asked, why is it that there is not the same rush to make new cuttings
now as in former times? The answer is, because the people concerned
with the mines are poorer nowadays. The attempt to restart operations,
renew plant, etc., is of recent date, and any one who ventures to open
up a new area runs a considerable risk. Supposing he hits upon a
productive field, he becomes a rich man, but supposing he draws a
blank, he loses the whole of his outlay; and that is a danger which
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