| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy: And without asking the servant who opened the door whether the
lady were at home, Stepan Arkadyevitch walked into the hall.
Levin followed him, more and more doubtful whether he was doing
right or wrong.
Looking at himself in the glass, Levin noticed that he was red in
the face, but he felt certain he was not drunk, and he followed
Stepan Arkadyevitch up the carpeted stairs. At the top Stepan
Arkadyevitch inquired of the footman, who bowed to him as to an
intimate friend, who was with Anna Arkadyevna, and received the
answer that it was M. Vorknev.
"Where are they?"
Anna Karenina |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Kenilworth by Walter Scott: other folks."
"May I ask her appearance, sir?" said Tressilian.
"Oh, sir," replied Master Goldthred, "I promise you, she was in
gentlewoman's attire--a very quaint and pleasing dress, that
might have served the Queen herself; for she had a forepart with
body and sleeves, of ginger-coloured satin, which, in my
judgment, must have cost by the yard some thirty shillings, lined
with murrey taffeta, and laid down and guarded with two broad
laces of gold and silver. And her hat, sir, was truly the best
fashioned thing that I have seen in these parts, being of tawny
taffeta, embroidered with scorpions of Venice gold, and having a
Kenilworth |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Story of an African Farm by Olive Schreiner: in the Bible because He tells us of it. We feel Him, we feel Him, we feel-
-that is all! And the poor, half-swamped devil mutters:
"But if the day should come when you do not feel?"
And we laugh and cry him down.
"It will never come--never," and the poor devil slinks to sleep again, with
his tail between his legs. Fierce assertion many times repeated is hard to
stand against; only time separates the truth from the lie. So we dream on.
One day we go with our father to town, to church. The townspeople rustle
in their silks, and the men in their sleek cloth, and settle themselves in
their pews, and the light shines in through the windows on the artificial
flowers in the women's bonnets. We have the same miserable feeling that we
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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 The Deputy of Arcis by Honore de Balzac: parliamentary forms of the Chamber."
"That is best," said the huge Monsieur Mollot, clerk of the court;
"otherwise what is here taking place would be a mere farce; we should
not be free in our action, in which case we might as well continue to
do the will of Monsieur Simon Giguet."
Simon said a few words to Beauvisage, who rose and delivered himself
of a "Messieurs!" in palpitating tones.
"Pardon me, Monsieur le president," said Achille Pigoult, "the
chairman presides, he does not speak."
"Messieurs," continued Beauvisage, prompted by Simon, "if we are--to
conform--to parliamentary usage--I shall beg--the honorable gentleman
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