| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Secret Sharer by Joseph Conrad: he stared straight out through the porthole, in which there
was not even a star to be seen. I had not interrupted him.
There was something that made comment impossible in his narrative,
or perhaps in himself; a sort of feeling, a quality, which I can't find
a name for. And when he ceased, all I found was a futile whisper:
"So you swam for our light?"
"Yes--straight for it. It was something to swim for.
I couldn't see any stars low down because the coast was in the way,
and I couldn't see the land, either. The water was like glass.
One might have been swimming in a confounded thousand-feet deep
cistern with no place for scrambling out anywhere; but what I didn't
The Secret Sharer |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Thuvia, Maid of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs: "He will tell you that which he deems it best you know.
I might tell you too much."
"Who is Tario?" asked Carthoris.
"Jeddak of Lothar," replied the guide, leading them
up the broad avenue down which they had but a moment
since seen the phantom army marching.
For half an hour they walked along lovely avenues between
the most gorgeous buildings that the two had ever seen.
Few people were in evidence. Carthoris could not but
note the deserted appearance of the mighty city.
At last they came to the royal palace. Carthoris saw
Thuvia, Maid of Mars |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Dreams by Olive Schreiner: where the ninth child lay. Bent forward and sleeping there, with the bees
flying about her head, she had a weird brain-picture; she thought the bees
lengthened and lengthened themselves out and became human creatures and
moved round and round her. Then one came to her softly, saying, "Let me
lay my hand upon thy side where the child sleeps. If I shall touch him he
shall be as I."
She asked, "Who are you?"
And he said, "I am Health. Whom I touch will have always the red blood
dancing in his veins; he will not know weariness nor pain; life will be a
long laugh to him."
"No," said another, "let me touch; for I am Wealth. If I touch him
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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 The Wrong Box by Stevenson & Osbourne: heart of the people must certainly be sounder than its head, for
his lucubrations were received with favour. That entitled 'How to
Live Cheerfully on Forty Pounds a Year', created a sensation
among the unemployed. 'Education: Its Aims, Objects, Purposes,
and Desirability', gained him the respect of the shallow-minded.
As for his celebrated essay on 'Life Insurance Regarded in its
Relation to the Masses', read before the Working Men's Mutual
Improvement Society, Isle of Dogs, it was received with a
'literal ovation' by an unintelligent audience of both sexes, and
so marked was the effect that he was next year elected honorary
president of the institution, an office of less than no
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