| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Professor by Charlotte Bronte: found myself on the road to Brussels, nothing could look vapid to
me. My sense of enjoyment possessed an edge whetted to the
finest, untouched, keen, exquisite. I was young; I had good
health; pleasure and I had never met; no indulgence of hers had
enervated or sated one faculty of my nature. Liberty I clasped in
my arms for the first time, and the influence of her smile and
embrace revived my life like the sun and the west wind. Yes, at
that epoch I felt like a morning traveller who doubts not that
from the hill he is ascending he shall behold a glorious sunrise;
what if the track be strait, steep, and stony? he sees it not;
his eyes are fixed on that summit, flushed already, flushed and
The Professor |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Concerning Christian Liberty by Martin Luther: Considerations addressed to Eugenius, a book which ought to be
known by heart by every pontiff. I do this, not from any desire
to teach, but as a duty, from that simple and faithful solicitude
which teaches us to be anxious for all that is safe for our
neighbours, and does not allow considerations of worthiness or
unworthiness to be entertained, being intent only on the dangers
or advantage of others. For since I know that your Blessedness is
driven and tossed by the waves at Rome, so that the depths of the
sea press on you with infinite perils, and that you are labouring
under such a condition of misery that you need even the least
help from any the least brother, I do not seem to myself to be
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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 De Profundis by Oscar Wilde: idea. But he could not stand stupid people, especially those who
are made stupid by education: people who are full of opinions not
one of which they even understand, a peculiarly modern type, summed
up by Christ when he describes it as the type of one who has the
key of knowledge, cannot use it himself, and does not allow other
people to use it, though it may be made to open the gate of God's
Kingdom. His chief war was against the Philistines. That is the
war every child of light has to wage. Philistinism was the note of
the age and community in which he lived. In their heavy
inaccessibility to ideas, their dull respectability, their tedious
orthodoxy, their worship of vulgar success, their entire
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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 Before Adam by Jack London: no little glee. Broken-Tooth did not want to go, and
every time his mother left the cave he sneaked back
into it. When she returned and found him there her
rages were delightful. Half the horde made a practice
of watching for these moments. First, from within the
cave, would come her scolding and shrieking. Then we
could hear sounds of the thrashing and the yelling of
Broken-Tooth. About this time the two younger children
joined in. And finally, like the eruption of a
miniature volcano, Broken-Tooth would come flying out.
At the end of several days his leaving home was
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