| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Lair of the White Worm by Bram Stoker: dragging itself through the jungle. 'So far as I could see,' he
said, 'it must have been eighty or one hundred feet in length.
Fully forty or fifty feet was on each side of the track, and though
the weight which it dragged had thinned it, it was as thick round as
a man's body. I suppose you know that when you are after tiger, it
is a point of honour not to shoot at anything else, as life may
depend on it. I could easily have spined this monster, but I felt
that I must not--so, with regret, I had to let it go.'
"Just imagine such a monster anywhere in this country, and at once
we could get a sort of idea of the 'worms,' which possibly did
frequent the great morasses which spread round the mouths of many of
Lair of the White Worm |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg by Mark Twain: Now if I may have your permission to stamp upon the faces of each of
these ostensible coins the names of the eighteen gentlemen who--"
Nine-tenths of the audience were on their feet in a moment--dog and
all--and the proposition was carried with a whirlwind of approving
applause and laughter.
They sat down, and all the Symbols except "Dr." Clay Harkness got
up, violently protesting against the proposed outrage, and
threatening to -
"I beg you not to threaten me," said the stranger calmly. "I know
my legal rights, and am not accustomed to being frightened at
bluster." [Applause.] He sat down. "Dr." Harkness saw an
The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Letters of Two Brides by Honore de Balzac: foundation of paternal authority cannot be stable. That is the foot of
the ladder of responsibility and subordination, which has for its
summit the King.
"The King stands for us all. To die for the King is to die for
oneself, for one's family, which, like the kingdom, cannot die. All
animals have certain instincts; the instinct of man is for family
life. A country is strong which consists of wealthy families, every
member of whom is interested in defending a common treasure; it is
weak when composed of scattered individuals, to whom it matters little
whether they obey seven or one, a Russian or a Corsican, so long as
each keeps his own plot of land, blind, in their wretched egotism, to
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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 Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton by Edith Wharton: you?" And as he continued to stare, she brought out sublimely:
"Take the rest--in imagination! Let it at least be of that much
use to you. Tell her I lied to her--she's too ready to believe
it! And so, after all, in a sense, I sha'n't have been wasted."
His stare hung on her, widening to a kind of wonder. She gave
the look back brightly, unblushingly, as though the expedient
were too simple to need oblique approaches. It was extraordinary
how a few words had swept them from an atmosphere of the most
complex dissimulations to this contact of naked souls.
It was not in Thursdale to expand with the pressure of fate; but
something in him cracked with it, and the rift let in new light.
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