| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Two Poets by Honore de Balzac: grown smaller of late; this is not an age of giants; men have shrunk,
everything about them shrinks, and house-room into the bargain. Great
mansions and great suites of rooms will be abolished sooner or later
in Paris, for no one will afford to live in the great houses built by
our forefathers. What a disgrace for our age if none of its books
should last! Dutch paper--that is, paper made from flax--will be quite
unobtainable in ten years' time. Well, your brother told me of this
idea of your father's, this plan for using vegetable fibre in paper-
making, so you see that if I succeed, you have a right to----"
Lucien came up at that moment and interrupted David's generous
assertion.
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Dead Souls by Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol: question made their appearance with napkins and a tray--the latter
bearing six decanters of variously-coloured beverages. These they
placed upon the table, and then ringed them about with glasses and
platefuls of every conceivable kind of appetiser. That done, the
servants applied themselves to bringing in various comestibles under
covers, through which could be heard the hissing of hot roast viands.
In particular did the "gawk" and the "thief" work hard at their tasks.
As a matter of fact, their appellations had been given them merely to
spur them to greater activity, for, in general, the barin was no lover
of abuse, but, rather, a kind-hearted man who, like most Russians,
could not get on without a sharp word or two. That is to say, he
Dead Souls |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Reason Discourse by Rene Descartes: to make the majority those experiments which may conduce to this end: but
I perceive likewise that they are such and so numerous, that neither my
hands nor my income, though it were a thousand times larger than it is,
would be sufficient for them all; so that according as henceforward I
shall have the means of making more or fewer experiments, I shall in the
same proportion make greater or less progress in the knowledge of nature.
This was what I had hoped to make known by the treatise I had written, and
so clearly to exhibit the advantage that would thence accrue to the public,
as to induce all who have the common good of man at heart, that is, all who
are virtuous in truth, and not merely in appearance, or according to opinion,
as well to communicate to me the experiments they had already made, as to
Reason Discourse |
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 Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte: contemplation.
"Is Miss Eyre there?" now demanded the master, half rising from his
seat to look round to the door, near which I still stood.
"Ah! well, come forward; be seated here." He drew a chair near his
own. "I am not fond of the prattle of children," he continued;
"for, old bachelor as I am, I have no pleasant associations
connected with their lisp. It would be intolerable to me to pass a
whole evening tete-e-tete with a brat. Don't draw that chair
farther off, Miss Eyre; sit down exactly where I placed it--if you
please, that is. Confound these civilities! I continually forget
them. Nor do I particularly affect simple-minded old ladies. By-
Jane Eyre |
