| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table by Oliver Wendell Holmes: next forty years? Oh, this terrible gift of second-sight that
comes to some of us when we begin to look through the silvered
rings of the ARCUS SENILIS!
TEN YEARS GONE. First turn in the race. A few broken down; two or
three bolted. Several show in advance of the ruck. CASSOCK, a
black colt, seems to be ahead of the rest; those black colts
commonly get the start, I have noticed, of the others, in the first
quarter. METEOR has pulled up.
TWENTY YEARS. Second corner turned. CASSOCK has dropped from the
front, and JUDEX, an iron-gray, has the lead. But look! how they
have thinned out! Down flat, - five, - six, - how many? They lie
The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Soul of a Bishop by H. G. Wells: discovered a fine point.
"If there was something else, an alternative, another religion,
another Church, to which one could go, the whole case would be
different. But to go from the church to nothingness isn't to go
from falsehood to truth. It's to go from truth, rather badly
expressed, rather conservatively hidden by its protections, truth
in an antiquated costume, to the blackest lie--in the world."
She took that point very brightly.
"One must hold fast to 'iligion," she said, and looked
earnestly at him and gripped fiercely, pink thumbs out, with her
beautiful hands held up.
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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 Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling: sleep under anything that looked so like a panther trap as that
hut, and when they shut the door he went through the window.
"Give him his will," said Messua's husband. "Remember he can
never till now have slept on a bed. If he is indeed sent in the
place of our son he will not run away."
So Mowgli stretched himself in some long, clean grass at the
edge of the field, but before he had closed his eyes a soft gray
nose poked him under the chin.
"Phew!" said Gray Brother (he was the eldest of Mother Wolf's
cubs). "This is a poor reward for following thee twenty miles.
Thou smellest of wood smoke and cattle--altogether like a man
The Jungle Book |
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 The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald: faintly handsome. When he saw us a damp gleam of hope sprang into his
light blue eyes.
"Hello, Wilson, old man," said Tom, slapping him jovially on the
shoulder. "How's business?"
"I can't complain," answered Wilson unconvincingly. "When are you going
to sell me that car?"
"Next week; I've got my man working on it now."
"Works pretty slow, don't he?"
"No, he doesn't," said Tom coldly. "And if you feel that way about it,
maybe I'd better sell it somewhere else after all."
"I don't mean that," explained Wilson quickly. "I just meant----"
The Great Gatsby |
