| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The American by Henry James: although he did endeavor according to his feeble lights to cultivate
refinement of diction, monsieur, if he wanted the real thing, should go
to the Theatre Francais.
Newman took an interest in French thriftiness and conceived a lively
admiration for Parisian economies. His own economic genius was so
entirely for operations on a larger scale, and, to move at his ease,
he needed so imperatively the sense of great risks and great prizes,
that he found an ungrudging entertainment in the spectacle of
fortunes made by the aggregation of copper coins, and in the minute
subdivision of labor and profit. He questioned M. Nioche about
his own manner of life, and felt a friendly mixture of compassion
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Father Damien by Robert Louis Stevenson: then proceed to criticise your utterance from several points of
view, divine and human, in the course of which I shall attempt to
draw again, and with more specification, the character of the dead
saint whom it has pleased you to vilify: so much being done, I
shall say farewell to you for ever.
"HONOLULU,
"August 2, 1889.
"Rev. H. B. GAGE.
"Dear Brother, - In answer to your inquires about Father Damien, I
can only reply that we who knew the man are surprised at the
extravagant newspaper laudations, as if he was a most saintly
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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 Glasses by Henry James: stranger, Mrs. Hammond Synge, the sister-in-law of one of the young
men I had just seen. She had lots of friends, but none of them
nice: she kept picking up impossible people. The Floyd-Taylors,
with whom she had been at Boulogne, were simply horrid. The
Hammond Synges were perhaps not so vulgar, but they had no
conscience in their dealings with her.
"She knows what I think of them," said Mrs. Meldrum, "and indeed
she knows what I think of most things."
"She shares that privilege with most of your friends!" I replied
laughing.
"No doubt; but possibly to some of my friends it makes a little
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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 Crowd by Gustave le Bon: them one of the most prominent of English scientific men, Mr.
Wallace, executed in their presence, and after having allowed
them to examine the objects and to place seals where they wished,
all the regulation spiritualistic phenomena, the materialisation
of spirits, writing on slates, &c. Having subsequently obtained
from these distinguished observers written reports admitting that
the phenomena observed could only have been obtained by
supernatural means, he revealed to them that they were the result
of very simple tricks. "The most astonishing feature of Monsieur
Davey's investigation," writes the author of this account, "is
not the marvellousness of the tricks themselves, but the extreme
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