| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Madam How and Lady Why by Charles Kingsley: long.
Which do you mean? Why, that is a bee.
Yes, it is a bee: and I wish I were as worthy in my place as that
bee is in hers. I wish I could act up as well as she does to the
true wisdom, which is self-sacrifice. For whom is that bee
working? For herself? If that was all, she only needs to suck
the honey as she goes. But she is storing up the wax under her
stomach, and bee-bread in her thighs--for whom? Not for herself
only, or even for her own children: but for the children of
another bee, her queen. For them she labours all day long, builds
for them, feeds them, nurses them, spends her love and cunning on
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from War and the Future by H. G. Wells: into the German trench along by the line of scraggy trees, at
which we peep discreetly, to-morrow night. We can peep
discreetly because just at present our guns are putting shrapnel
over the enemy at the rate of about three shells a minute, the
puffs follow each other up and down the line, and no Germans are
staring out to see us.
The Germans "strafed" this trench overnight, and the men are
tired and sleepy. Our guns away behind us are doing their best
now to give them a rest by strafing the Germans. One or two men
are in each forward sap keeping a look out; the rest sleep, a
motionless sleep, in the earthy shelter pits that have been
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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 Herbert West: Reanimator by H. P. Lovecraft: Dr. Halsey in particular had distinguished himself in sacrificing
service, applying his extreme skill with whole-hearted energy
to cases which many others shunned because of danger or apparent
hopelessness. Before a month was over the fearless dean had become
a popular hero, though he seemed unconscious of his fame as he
struggled to keep from collapsing with physical fatigue and nervous
exhaustion. West could not withhold admiration for the fortitude
of his foe, but because of this was even more determined to prove
to him the truth of his amazing doctrines. Taking advantage of
the disorganisation of both college work and municipal health
regulations, he managed to get a recently deceased body smuggled
Herbert West: Reanimator |
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 To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf: sits, she thought, and the children are quite silent still. And she
could not reach him either. The sympathy she had not given him weighed
her down. It made it difficult for her to paint.
She had always found him difficult. She never had been able to praise
him to his face, she remembered. And that reduced their relationship to
something neutral, without that element of sex in it which made his
manner to Minta so gallant, almost gay. He would pick a flower for
her, lend her his books. But could he believe that Minta read them?
She dragged them about the garden, sticking in leaves to mark the
place.
"D'you remember, Mr Carmichael?" she was inclined to ask, looking at
To the Lighthouse |
