| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Soul of the Far East by Percival Lowell: of expression, down into the very matter of thought. Ideas of ours
which we deemed innate find in them no home, while methods which
strike us as preposterously unnatural appear to be their birthright.
From the standing of a wet umbrella on its handle instead of its
head to dry to the striking of a match away in place of toward one,
there seems to be no action of our daily lives, however trivial,
but finds with them its appropriate reaction--equal but opposite.
Indeed, to one anxious of conforming to the manners and customs of
the country, the only road to right lies in following unswervingly
that course which his inherited instincts assure him to be wrong.
Yet these people are human beings; with all their eccentricities
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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 Alkahest by Honore de Balzac: Towards the year 1783, Monsieur Balthazar Claes-Molina de Nourho, then
twenty-two years of age, was what is called in France a fine man. He
came to finish his education in Paris, where he acquired excellent
manners in the society of Madame d'Egmont, Count Horn, the Prince of
Aremberg, the Spanish ambassador, Helvetius, and other Frenchmen
originally from Belgium, or coming lately thence, whose birth or
wealth won them admittance among the great seigneurs who at that time
gave the tone to social life. Young Claes found several relations and
friends ready to launch him into the great world at the very moment
when that world was about to fall. Like other young men, he was at
first more attracted by glory and science than by the vanities of
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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 On Horsemanship by Xenophon: twirlings about."
To put the matter in a nutshell: given that the horse is sound-footed,
gentle, moderately fast, willing and able to undergo toil, and above
all things[10] obedient--such an animal, we venture to predict, will
give the least trouble and the greatest security to his rider in the
circumstances of war; while, conversely, a beast who either out of
sluggishness needs much driving, or from excess of mettle much coaxing
and manouvring, will give his rider work enough to occupy both his
hands and a sinking of the heart when dangers thicken.
[10] Al. "thoroughly."
IV
On Horsemanship |
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 Underground City by Jules Verne: of coal used to be passing night and day. The rails, with their
rotten sleepers, now disused, were then constantly ground by the weight
of wagons. Now stony roads took the place of the old mining tramways.
James Starr felt as if he was traversing a desert.
The engineer gazed about him with a saddened eye.
He stopped now and then to take breath. He listened.
The air was no longer filled with distant whistlings and the panting
of engines. None of those black vapors which the manufacturer
loves to see, hung in the horizon, mingling with the clouds.
No tall cylindrical or prismatic chimney vomited out smoke,
after being fed from the mine itself; no blast-pipe was puffing
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