| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy: And then the party drove off and vanished in the night
shades, and Yeobright entered the house. The ticking
of the clock was the only sound that greeted him, for not
a soul remained; Christian, who acted as cook, valet,
and gardener to Clym, sleeping at his father's house.
Yeobright sat down in one of the vacant chairs,
and remained in thought a long time. His mother's old
chair was opposite; it had been sat in that evening by
those who had scarcely remembered that it ever was hers.
But to Clym she was almost a presence there, now as always.
Whatever she was in other people's memories, in his she
Return of the Native |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Fisherman's Luck by Henry van Dyke: Walton was Leigh Hunt. Here, again, I fancy that partizan prejudice
had something to do with the dislike. Hunt was a radical in
politics and religion. Moreover there was a feline strain in his
character, which made it necessary for him to scratch somebody now
and then, as a relief to his feelings.
Walton was a great quoter. His book is not "stuffed," as Franck
jealously alleged, but it is certainly well sauced with piquant
references to other writers, as early as the author of the Book of
Job, and as late as John Dennys, who betrayed to the world THE
SECRETS OF ANGLING in 1613. Walton further seasoned his book with
fragments of information about fish and fishing, more or less
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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 Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg by Mark Twain: intoxication of pride and joy had sobered to a soft, sweet, silent
delight--a sort of deep, nameless, unutterable content. All faces
bore a look of peaceful, holy happiness.
Then a change came. It was a gradual change; so gradual that its
beginnings were hardly noticed; maybe were not noticed at all,
except by Jack Halliday, who always noticed everything; and always
made fun of it, too, no matter what it was. He began to throw out
chaffing remarks about people not looking quite so happy as they did
a day or two ago; and next he claimed that the new aspect was
deepening to positive sadness; next, that it was taking on a sick
look; and finally he said that everybody was become so moody,
The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg |
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 Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne: But my uncle would not wait. He spurred on to the edge. His steed
lowered his head to examine the nearest waves and stopped. My uncle,
who had an instinct of his own, too, applied pressure, and was again
refused by the animal significantly shaking his head. Then followed
strong language, and the whip; but the brute answered these arguments
with kicks and endeavours to throw his rider. At last the clever
little pony, with a bend of his knees, started from under the
Professor's legs, and left him standing upon two boulders on the
shore just like the colossus of Rhodes.
"Confounded brute!" cried the unhorsed horseman, suddenly degraded
into a pedestrian, just as ashamed as a cavalry officer degraded to a
Journey to the Center of the Earth |
