| 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: you my good friends, deserued at the hands of Fortune,
that she sends you to Prison hither?
Guil. Prison, my Lord?
Ham. Denmark's a Prison
Rosin. Then is the World one
Ham. A goodly one, in which there are many Confines,
Wards, and Dungeons; Denmarke being one o'th'
worst
Rosin. We thinke not so my Lord
Ham. Why then 'tis none to you; for there is nothing
either good or bad, but thinking makes it so: to me it is
Hamlet |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Cousin Betty by Honore de Balzac: their love, pure, honest, and sincere.
At last the great day dawned--for it was to be a great day not only
for Wenceslas and Hortense, but for old Hulot too. Madame Marneffe was
to give a house-warming in her new apartment the day after becoming
Hulot's mistress /en titre/, and after the marriage of the lovers.
Who but has once in his life been a guest at a wedding-ball? Every
reader can refer to his reminiscences, and will probably smile as he
calls up the images of all that company in their Sunday-best faces as
well as their finest frippery.
If any social event can prove the influence of environment, is it not
this? In fact, the Sunday-best mood of some reacts so effectually on
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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 The Black Arrow by Robert Louis Stevenson: and let his body slip.
The cord was knotted, which made it the easier to descend; but so
furious was Dick's hurry, and so small his experience of such
gymnastics, that he span round and round in mid-air like a criminal
upon a gibbet, and now beat his head, and now bruised his hands,
against the rugged stonework of the wall. The air roared in his
ears; he saw the stars overhead, and the reflected stars below him
in the moat, whirling like dead leaves before the tempest. And
then he lost hold, and fell, and soused head over ears into the icy
water.
When he came to the surface his hand encountered the rope, which,
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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 The Wheels of Chance by H. G. Wells: pleasure of rushing through the keen, sweet, morning air. He
reached out his thumb and twanged his bell out of sheer
happiness.
"'He's a bloomin' Dook--he is!'" said Mr. Hoopdriver to himself,
in a soft undertone, as he went soaring down the hill, and again,
"'He's a bloomin' Dook!"' He opened his mouth in a silent laugh.
It was having a decent cut did it. His social superiority had
been so evident that even a man like that noticed it. No more
Manchester Department for ten days! Out of Manchester, a Man. The
draper Hoopdriver, the Hand, had vanished from existence. Instead
was a gentleman, a man of pleasure, with a five-pound note, two
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