| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Falk by Joseph Conrad: showed, in sunshine, the squalor of sea waifs, the
dried white salt, the rust, the jagged broken
places. Then the gales came again. They kept
body and soul together on short rations. Once, an
English ship, scudding in a storm, tried to stand
by them, heaving-to pluckily under their lee. The
seas swept her decks; the men in oilskins clinging
to her rigging looked at them, and they made des-
perate signs over their shattered bulwarks. Sud-
denly her main-topsail went, yard and all, in a ter-
rific squall; she had to bear up under bare poles,
Falk |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from My Aunt Margaret's Mirror by Walter Scott: some shifting of light and darkness over the face of the
wonderful glass, a long perspective of arches and columns began
to arrange itself on its sides, and a vaulted roof on the upper
part of it, till, after many oscillations, the whole vision
gained a fixed and stationary appearance, representing the
interior of a foreign church. The pillars were stately, and hung
with scutcheons; the arches were lofty and magnificent; the floor
was lettered with funeral inscriptions. But there were no
separate shrines, no images, no display of chalice or crucifix on
the altar. It was, therefore, a Protestant church upon the
Continent. A clergyman dressed in the Geneva gown and band stood
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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 Thus Spake Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche: they only believe the stammerer?
They have something whereof they are proud. What do they call it, that
which maketh them proud? Culture, they call it; it distinguisheth them
from the goatherds.
They dislike, therefore, to hear of 'contempt' of themselves. So I will
appeal to their pride.
I will speak unto them of the most contemptible thing: that, however, is
THE LAST MAN!"
And thus spake Zarathustra unto the people:
It is time for man to fix his goal. It is time for man to plant the germ
of his highest hope.
Thus Spake Zarathustra |
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 Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson by Mark Twain: Childless people are not difficult to please.
Judge Driscoll had gone privately to his brother, a month before,
and bought Chambers. He had heard that Tom had been trying to get
his father to sell the boy down the river, and he wanted to prevent
the scandal--for public sentiment did not approve of that way of treating
family servants for light cause or for no cause.
Percy Driscoll had worn himself out in trying to save his great
speculative landed estate, and had died without succeeding.
He was hardly in his grave before the boom collapsed and left his
envied young devil of an heir a pauper. But that was nothing; his uncle
told him he should be his heir and have all his fortune when he died;
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