| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Soul of the Far East by Percival Lowell: to take that second look that has left him what he is. Not that
Fortune has been unpropitious; only blind. Fate has offered him
opportunity enough; too much, perhaps. For in Japan the exposure
of the female form is without a parallel in latitude. Never nude,
it is frequently naked. The result artistically is much the same,
though the cause be different. For it is a fatal mistake to suppose
the Japanese an immodest people. According to their own standards,
they are exceedingly modest. No respectable Japanese woman would,
for instance, ever for a moment turn out her toes in walking.
It is considered immodest to do so. Their code is, however, not so
whimsical as this bit of etiquette might suggest. The intent is
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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 Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling: beaten and left for dead; so he knew the manners and customs of
men. There was very little talking at the Rock. The cubs tumbled
over each other in the center of the circle where their mothers
and fathers sat, and now and again a senior wolf would go quietly
up to a cub, look at him carefully, and return to his place on
noiseless feet. Sometimes a mother would push her cub far out
into the moonlight to be sure that he had not been overlooked.
Akela from his rock would cry: "Ye know the Law--ye know the
Law. Look well, O Wolves!" And the anxious mothers would take up
the call: "Look--look well, O Wolves!"
At last--and Mother Wolf's neck bristles lifted as the time
 The Jungle Book |