| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Chouans by Honore de Balzac: pleasure of an interview with the Gars before long."
"How so?" asked Hulot, moving back a step to get a better view of this
strange individual.
"Mademoiselle de Verneuil is in love with him," replied Corentin, in a
thick voice, "and perhaps he loves her. A marquis, a knight of Saint-
Louis, young, brilliant, perhaps rich,--what a list of temptations!
She would be foolish indeed not to look after her own interests and
try to marry him rather than betray him. The girl is attempting to
fool us. But I saw hesitation in her eyes. They probably have a
rendezvous; perhaps they've met already. Well, to-morrow I shall have
him by the forelock. Yesterday he was nothing more than the enemy of
The Chouans |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Magic of Oz by L. Frank Baum: Cap'n Bill was rather fat and couldn't see his own feet very well,
but he squatted down and examined Trot's feet and decided that the
Glass Cat was right.
"This is hard luck," he declared, in a voice that showed he was
uneasy at the discovery. "We're pris'ners, Trot, on this funny
island, an' I'd like to know how we're ever goin' to get loose, so's
we can get home again."
"Now I know why the Kalidah laughed at us," said the girl, "and why
he said none of the beasts ever came to this island. The horrid
creature knew we'd be caught, and wouldn't warn us."
In the meantime, the Kalidah, although pinned fast to the earth by
The Magic of Oz |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Woman and Labour by Olive Schreiner: lead and instruct in religious matters; that all Englishmen, and none but
Englishmen, should engage in trade; that each German should make his living
by music, and none but a German allowed to practise it, would drive to
despair the unfortunate individual Englishman, whose most marked deficiency
might be in the direction of finance and bartering trade power; the Jew,
whose religious instincts might be entirely rudimentary; or the German, who
could not distinguish one note from another; and the society as a whole
would be an irremediable loser, in one of the heaviest of all forms of
social loss--the loss of the full use of the highest capacities of all its
members.
It may be that with sexes as with races, the subtlest physical difference
|
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 Hermione's Little Group of Serious Thinkers by Don Marquis: being able to stop it -- I hope you follow me. Isn't
it wonderful to be in touch with the Universe in
that way! Not, of course, that the shop girls who
show you the fabrics and things are always understanding.
The working classes are so often ungrateful to
us advanced thinkers. Sometimes I am almost pro-
voked to the point of giving up my Social Better-
ment work when I think HOW ungrateful they are.
But some of us, in every age, must suffer at the
hands of the masses for the sake of the masses, if
you know what I mean.
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