| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Passionate Pilgrim by William Shakespeare: A doubtful good, a gloss, a glass, a flower,
Lost, vaded, broken, dead within an hour.
And as goods lost are seld or never found,
As vaded gloss no rubbing will refresh,
As flowers dead lie wither'd on the ground,
As broken glass no cement can redress,
So beauty blemish'd once's for ever lost,
In spite of physic, painting, pain and cost.
XIV.
Good night, good rest. Ah, neither be my share:
She bade good night that kept my rest away;
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Fables by Robert Louis Stevenson: touchstone; and now I may turn my reins, and ride home to the King
and to the maid of the dun that makes my mouth to sing and my heart
enlarge."
Now when he came to the dun, he saw children playing by the gate
where the King had met him in the old days; and this stayed his
pleasure, for he thought in his heart, "It is here my children
should be playing". And when he came into the hall, there was his
brother on the high seat and the maid beside him; and at that his
anger rose, for he thought in his heart, "It is I that should be
sitting there, and the maid beside me".
"Who are you?" said his brother. "And what make you in the dun?"
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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 Muse of the Department by Honore de Balzac: There are, in fact, men who have something of the monkey in them by
nature, and to whom the assumption of the most engaging forms of
sentiment is so easy that the actor is not detected; and Lousteau's
natural gifts had been fully developed on the stage on which he had
hitherto figured.
Between the months of April and July, when Dinah expected her
confinement, she discovered why it was that Lousteau had not triumphed
over poverty; he was idle and had no power of will. The brain, to be
sure, must obey its own laws; it recognizes neither the exigencies of
life nor the voice of honor; a man cannot write a great book because a
woman is dying, or to pay a discreditable debt, or to bring up a
The Muse of the Department |
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 King Henry VI by William Shakespeare: KING.
O God, what mischiefs work the wicked ones,
Heaping confusion on their own heads thereby!
QUEEN.
Gloster, see here the tainture of thy nest;
And look thyself be faultless, thou wert best.
GLOSTER.
Madam, for myself, to heaven I do appeal,
How I have lov'd my king and commonweal;
And, for my wife, I know not how it stands.
Sorry I am to hear what I have heard;
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