| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad: out of the stream of life. He walked. And suddenly turning into a
strip of a front garden with a mangy grass plot, he let himself
into a small grimy house with a latch-key he took out of his
pocket.
He threw himself down on his bed all dressed, and lay still for a
whole quarter of an hour. Then he sat up suddenly, drawing up his
knees, and clasping his legs. The first dawn found him open-eyed,
in that same posture. This man who could walk so long, so far, so
aimlessly, without showing a sign of fatigue, could also remain
sitting still for hours without stirring a limb or an eyelid. But
when the late sun sent its rays into the room he unclasped his
The Secret Agent |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Lord Arthur Savile's Crime, etc. by Oscar Wilde: calling out now and then to each other; on the back of a huge grey
horse, the leader of a jangling team, sat a chubby boy, with a
bunch of primroses in his battered hat, keeping tight hold of the
mane with his little hands, and laughing; and the great piles of
vegetables looked like masses of jade against the morning sky, like
masses of green jade against the pink petals of some marvellous
rose. Lord Arthur felt curiously affected, he could not tell why.
There was something in the dawn's delicate loveliness that seemed
to him inexpressibly pathetic, and he thought of all the days that
break in beauty, and that set in storm. These rustics, too, with
their rough, good-humoured voices, and their nonchalant ways, what
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Unseen World and Other Essays by John Fiske: an excess of temerity to assert that any one of the supernatural
accounts contained in them rests on contemporary authority. Of
all history, the miraculous part should be attested by the
strongest testimony, whereas it is invariably attested by the
weakest. And the paucity of miracles wherever we have
contemporary records, as in the case of primitive Islamism, is a
most significant fact.
In attempting to defend his principle of never accepting a
miracle, M. Renan has indeed got into a sorry plight, and Mr.
Rogers, in controverting him, has not greatly helped the matter.
By stirring M. Renan's bemuddled pool, Mr. Rogers has only
The Unseen World and Other Essays |
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 Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg by Mark Twain: and individually responsible that no harm shall come to it. Do you-
-does each of you--accept this great trust? [Tumultuous assent.]
Then all is well. Transmit it to your children and to your
children's children. To-day your purity is beyond reproach--see to
it that it shall remain so. To-day there is not a person in your
community who could be beguiled to touch a penny not his own--see to
it that you abide in this grace. ["We will! we will!"] This is not
the place to make comparisons between ourselves and other
communities--some of them ungracious towards us; they have their
ways, we have ours; let us be content. [Applause.] I am done.
Under my hand, my friends, rests a stranger's eloquent recognition
The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg |
