| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from On the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin: Glacial period, which forms only a part of one whole geological period; and
likewise to reflect on the great changes of level, on the inordinately
great change of climate, on the prodigious lapse of time, all included
within this same glacial period. Yet it may be doubted whether in any
quarter of the world, sedimentary deposits, including fossil remains, have
gone on accumulating within the same area during the whole of this period.
It is not, for instance, probable that sediment was deposited during the
whole of the glacial period near the mouth of the Mississippi, within that
limit of depth at which marine animals can flourish; for we know what vast
geographical changes occurred in other parts of America during this space
of time. When such beds as were deposited in shallow water near the mouth
On the Origin of Species |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Silas Marner by George Eliot: him."
Godfrey looked up at Nancy with a flushed face and smarting dilated
eyes. This frustration of a purpose towards which he had set out
under the exalted consciousness that he was about to compensate in
some degree for the greatest demerit of his life, made him feel the
air of the room stifling.
"Let us go," he said, in an under-tone.
"We won't talk of this any longer now," said Nancy, rising.
"We're your well-wishers, my dear--and yours too, Marner. We
shall come and see you again. It's getting late now."
In this way she covered her husband's abrupt departure, for Godfrey
Silas Marner |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Westward Ho! by Charles Kingsley: stripes in the public place, and then go to the galleys for seven
years. And there, gentlemen, ofttimes I thought that it had been
better for me to have been burned at once and for all: but you know
as well as I what a floating hell of heat and cold, hunger and
thirst, stripes and toil, is every one of those accursed craft. In
which hell, nevertheless, gentlemen, I found the road to heaven,--I
had almost said heaven itself. For it fell out, by God's mercy,
that my next comrade was an Englishman like myself, a young man of
Bristol, who, as he told me, had been some manner of factor on
board poor Captain Barker's ship, and had been a preacher among the
Anabaptists here in England. And, oh! Sir Richard Grenville, if
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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 Marie by H. Rider Haggard: out with the others belonging to the farm, having first knee-haltered
them tightly, so that they should not run away home.
This done, the Heer Marais showed me the room in which we were to have
our lessons, one of the "sitkammer", or sitting chambers, whereof,
unlike most Boer stead, this house boasted two. I remember that the
floor was made of "daga", that is, ant-heap earth mixed with cow-dung,
into which thousands of peach-stones had been thrown while it was still
soft, in order to resist footwear--a rude but fairly efficient
expedient, and one not unpleasing to the eye. For the rest, there was
one window opening on to the veranda, which, in that bright climate,
admitted a shaded but sufficient light, especially as it always stood
Marie |
