| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Hamlet by William Shakespeare: Helpe, helpe, hoa
Pol. What hoa, helpe, helpe, helpe
Ham. How now, a Rat? dead for a Ducate, dead
Pol. Oh I am slaine.
Killes Polonius
Qu. Oh me, what hast thou done?
Ham. Nay I know not, is it the King?
Qu. Oh what a rash, and bloody deed is this?
Ham. A bloody deed, almost as bad good Mother,
As kill a King, and marrie with his Brother
Qu. As kill a King?
Hamlet |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals by Charles Darwin: A tune is always the same tune, whether it is sung loudly or softly,
by a child or a man; whether it is played on a flute or on a trombone.
The purely musical effect of any sound depends on its place
in what is technically called a `scale;' the same sound producing
absolutely different effects on the ear, according as it is heard
in connection with one or another series of sounds.
[4] Mr. Tylor (`Primitive Culture,' 1871, vol. i. p. 166), in his
discussion on this subject, alludes to the whining of the dog.
[5] `Naturgeschichte der Saugethiere von Paraguay,' 1830, s. 46.
[6] Quoted by Gratiolet, `De la Physionomie,' 1865, p. 115.
"It is on this RELATIVE association of the sounds that all the
Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Through the Looking-Glass by Lewis Carroll: wondering YOU hadn't got some too. I thought it was the regular
rule.'
`She's coming!' cried the Larkspur. `I hear her footstep,
thump, thump, thump, along the gravel-walk!'
Alice looked round eagerly, and found that it was the Red
Queen. `She's grown a good deal!' was her first remark. She had
indeed: when Alice first found her in the ashes, she had been
only three inches high--and here she was, half a head taller
than Alice herself!
`It's the fresh air that does it,' said the Rose:
`wonderfully fine air it is, out here.'
Through the Looking-Glass |
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 Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia by Samuel Johnson: land, I looked round about me in pleasing terror, and thinking my
soul enlarged by the boundless prospect, imagined that I could gaze
around me for ever without satiety; but in a short time I grew
weary of looking on barren uniformity, where I could only see again
what I had already seen. I then descended into the ship, and
doubted for awhile whether all my future pleasures would not end,
like this, in disgust and disappointment. 'Yet surely,' said I,
'the ocean and the land are very different. The only variety of
water is rest and motion. But the earth has mountains and valleys,
deserts and cities; it is inhabited by men of different customs and
contrary opinions; and I may hope to find variety in life, though I
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