| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Tour Through Eastern Counties of England by Daniel Defoe: the Fen Country; and great part, if not all, the Isle of Ely lies
in this county and Norfolk. The rest of Cambridgeshire is almost
wholly a corn country, and of that corn five parts in six of all
they sow is barley, which is generally sold to Ware and Royston,
and other great malting towns in Hertfordshire, and is the fund
from whence that vast quantity of malt, called Hertfordshire malt,
is made, which is esteemed the best in England. As Essex, Suffolk,
and Norfolk are taken up in manufactures, and famed for industry,
this county has no manufacture at all; nor are the poor, except the
husbandmen, famed for anything so much as idleness and sloth, to
their scandal be it spoken. What the reason of it is I know not.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Door in the Wall, et. al. by H. G. Wells: was nothing but War and Death!"
I had an inspiration. " After all," I said, "it could have
been only a dream."
"A dream!" he cried, flaming upon me, "a dream--when, even
now--"
For the first time he became animated. A faint flush crept
into his cheek. He raised his open hand and clenched it, and
dropped it to his knee. He spoke, looking away from me, and for
all the rest of the time he looked away. "We are but phantoms!" he
said, "and the phantoms of phantoms, desires like cloud-shadows and
wills of straw that eddy in the wind; the days pass, use and wont
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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 Democracy In America, Volume 1 by Alexis de Toqueville: wilds were at hand; and whilst the emigrant from the United
States purchased an extensive estate with the earnings of a short
term of labor, the Canadian paid as much for land as he would
have done in France. Nature offers the solitudes of the New World
to Europeans; but they are not always acquainted with the means
of turning her gifts to account. Other peoples of America have
the same physical conditions of prosperity as the
Anglo-Americans, but without their laws and their manners; and
these peoples are wretched. The laws and manners of the
Anglo-Americans are therefore that efficient cause of their
greatness which is the object of my inquiry.
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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 Tess of the d'Urbervilles, A Pure Woman by Thomas Hardy: save his soul alive, and why should she deem it
unnatural in him? It was but the usage of thought
which had been jarred in her at hearing good new words
in bad old notes. The greater the sinner the greater
the saint; it was not necessary to dive far into
Christian history to discover that.
Such impressions as these moved her vaguely, and
without strict definiteness. As soon as the nerveless
pause of her surprise would allow her to stir, her
impulse was to pass on out of his sight. He had
obviously not discerned her yet in her position against
Tess of the d'Urbervilles, A Pure Woman |
