| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Odyssey by Homer: the open sea, we went on till we reached the Aeaean island where
there is dawn and sun-rise as in other places. We then drew our
ship on to the sands and got out of her on to the shore, where
we went to sleep and waited till day should break.
"Then, when the child of morning, rosy-fingered Dawn, appeared,
I sent some men to Circe's house to fetch the body of Elpenor.
We cut firewood from a wood where the headland jutted out into
the sea, and after we had wept over him and lamented him we
performed his funeral rites. When his body and armour had been
burned to ashes, we raised a cairn, set a stone over it, and at
the top of the cairn we fixed the oar that he had been used to
The Odyssey |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Poems by T. S. Eliot: Non torno viva alcun, s'i'odo il vero,
Senza tema d'infamia ti rispondo.
Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherized upon a table;
Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,
The muttering retreats
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
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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 Master of the World by Jules Verne: and indeed, its outlines began to show some fifteen miles ahead.
During our passage, a few boats had been seen, but we had passed them
at a long distance, a distance which our captain could easily keep as
great as he pleased. Moreover, the "Terror" lay so low upon the
water, that at even a mile away it would have been difficult to
discover her.
Now, however, the hills encircling the end of Lake Erie, came within
vision, beyond Buffalo, forming the sort of funnel by which Lake Erie
pours its waters into the channel of the Niagara river. Some dunes
rose on the right, groups of trees stood out here and there. In the
distance, several freight steamers and fishing smacks appeared. The
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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 Man against the Sky by Edwin Arlington Robinson: We come, we go; and when we're done, we're done."
"By God, you sing that song as if you knew it!"
Said I, by way of cheering him; "what ails ye?"
"I think I must have come down here to think,"
Says he to that, and pulls his little beard;
"Your fly will serve as well as anybody,
And what's his hour? He flies, and flies, and flies,
And in his fly's mind has a brave appearance;
And then your spider gets him in her net,
And eats him out, and hangs him up to dry.
That's Nature, the kind mother of us all.
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