| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift: usually three inches wide, and three feet make a piece. The
sempstresses took my measure as I lay on the ground, one standing
at my neck, and another at my mid-leg, with a strong cord
extended, that each held by the end, while a third measured the
length of the cord with a rule of an inch long. Then they
measured my right thumb, and desired no more; for by a
mathematical computation, that twice round the thumb is once
round the wrist, and so on to the neck and the waist, and by the
help of my old shirt, which I displayed on the ground before them
for a pattern, they fitted me exactly. Three hundred tailors were
employed in the same manner to make me clothes; but they had
Gulliver's Travels |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe: wares.' Here the woman began to give him ill words, and stood at his
door all that day, telling her tale to all the people that came, till the
doctor finding she turned away his customers, was obliged to call her
upstairs again, and give her his box of physic for nothing, which
perhaps, too, was good for nothing when she had it.
But to return to the people, whose confusions fitted them to be
imposed upon by all sorts of pretenders and by every mountebank.
There is no doubt but these quacking sort of fellows raised great gains
out of the miserable people, for we daily found the crowds that ran
after them were infinitely greater, and their doors were more thronged
than those of Dr Brooks, Dr Upton, Dr Hodges, Dr Berwick, or any,
A Journal of the Plague Year |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Deserted Woman by Honore de Balzac: tolerates the sub-prefect much as he submits to the taxes, and
declines to acknowledge any of the novel powers created by the
nineteenth century, pointing out to you as a political monstrosity the
fact that the prime minister is a man of no birth. His wife takes a
decided tone, and talks in a loud voice. She has had adorers in her
time, but takes the sacrament regularly at Easter. She brings up her
daughters badly, and is of the opinion that they will always be rich
enough with their name.
Neither husband nor wife has the remotest idea of modern luxury. They
retain a livery only seen elsewhere on the stage, and cling to old
fashions in plate, furniture, and equipages, as in language and manner
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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 King of the Golden River by John Ruskin: polite inquiry. "I am the king of what you mortals call the Golden
River. The shape you saw me in was owing to the malice of a
stronger king, from whose enchantments you have this instant freed
me. What I have seen of you and your conduct to your wicked
brothers renders me willing to serve you; therefore, attend to what
I tell you. Whoever shall climb to the top of that mountain from
which you see the Golden River issue, and shall cast into the stream
at its source three drops of holy water, for him and for him only
the river shall turn to gold. But no one failing in his first can
succeed in a second attempt, and if anyone shall cast unholy water
into the river, it will overwhelm him and he will become a black
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