| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Girl with the Golden Eyes by Honore de Balzac: at their value, and are sufficiently profound to have one thought
beyond their friends, whom they exploit; then of evenings, when they
lay their heads on their pillows, they weigh men as a miser weighs his
gold pieces. The one are vexed at an aimless impertinence, and allow
themselves to be ridiculed by the diplomatic, who make them dance for
them by pulling what is the main string of these puppets--their
vanity. Thus, a day comes when those who had nothing have something,
and those who had something have nothing. The latter look at their
comrades who have achieved positions as cunning fellows; their hearts
may be bad, but their heads are strong. "He is very strong!" is the
supreme praise accorded to those who have attained /quibuscumque
The Girl with the Golden Eyes |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Middlemarch by George Eliot: to recommend him."
"Why, my dear," said Mrs. Vincy, "you seemed as pleased as could
be about it. It's true, I wasn't at home; but Rosamond told me you
hadn't a word to say against the engagement. And she has begun
to buy in the best linen and cambric for her underclothing."
"Not by my will," said Mr. Vincy. "I shall have enough to do this year,
with an idle scamp of a son, without paying for wedding-clothes.
The times are as tight as can be; everybody is being ruined;
and I don't believe Lydgate has got a farthing. I shan't give
my consent to their marrying. Let 'em wait, as their elders
have done before 'em."
Middlemarch |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Heroes by Charles Kingsley: 'As for arms, I have enough, as you see. And as for troops,
an honest man is good enough company for himself. Why should
I not go alone toward Athens?'
'If you do, you must look warily about you on the Isthmus,
lest you meet Sinis the robber, whom men call Pituocamptes
the pine-bender; for he bends down two pine-trees, and binds
all travellers hand and foot between them, and when he lets
the trees go again their bodies are torn in sunder.'
'And after that,' said another, 'you must go inland, and not
dare to pass over the cliffs of Sciron; for on the left hand
are the mountains, and on the right the sea, so that you have
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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 Juana by Honore de Balzac: sighs unheeded, devotions unrewarded,--on earth at least,--splendid
silences misconstrued; vengeances withheld, disdained; generosities
perpetually bestowed and wasted; pleasures longed for and denied;
angelic charities secretly accomplished,--in short, all the religions
of womanhood and its inextinguishable love.
Juana knew that life; fate spared her nought. She was wholly a wife,
but a sorrowful and suffering wife; a wife incessantly wounded, yet
forgiving always; a wife pure as a flawless diamond,--she who had the
beauty and the glow of the diamond, and in that beauty, that glow, a
vengeance in her hand; for she was certainly not a woman to fear the
dagger added to her "dot."
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