| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Waste Land by T. S. Eliot: There I saw one I knew, and stopped him, crying 'Stetson!
'You who were with me in the ships at Mylae! 70
'That corpse you planted last year in your garden,
'Has it begun to sprout? Will it bloom this year?
'Or has the sudden frost disturbed its bed?
Line 42 Od'] Oed' -- Editor.
'Oh keep the Dog far hence, that's friend to men,
'Or with his nails he'll dig it up again!
'You! hypocrite lecteur! -- mon semblable, -- mon frère!'
II. A GAME OF CHESS
THE Chair she sat in, like a burnished throne,
The Waste Land |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Commission in Lunacy by Honore de Balzac: to the opinion of my brethren, I am perfectly convinced of the power
of the will regarded as a motor force. All collusion and charlatanism
apart, I have seen the results of such a possession. Actions promised
during sleep by a magnetized patient to the magnetizer have been
scrupulously performed on waking. The will of one had become the will
of the other."
"Every kind of action?"
"Yes."
"Even a criminal act?"
"Even a crime."
"If it were not from you, I would not listen to such a thing."
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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 Richard III by William Shakespeare: Who spoke of brotherhood? Who spoke of love?
Who told me how the poor soul did forsake
The mighty Warwick and did fight for me?
Who told me, in the field at Tewksbury
When Oxford had me down, he rescued me
And said 'Dear Brother, live, and be a king'?
Who told me, when we both lay in the field
Frozen almost to death, how he did lap me
Even in his garments, and did give himself,
All thin and naked, to the numb cold night?
All this from my remembrance brutish wrath
Richard III |
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 Rape of Lucrece by William Shakespeare: not requiring or staying for the people's suffrages, had
possessed himself of the kingdom, went, accompanied with his sons
and other noblemen of Rome, to besiege Ardea. During which siege
the principal men of the army meeting one evening at the tent of
Sextus Tarquinius, the king's son, in their discourses after
supper, every one commended the virtues of his own wife; among
whom Collatinus extolled the incomparable chastity of his wife
Lucretia. In that pleasant humour they all posted to Rome; and
intending, by their secret and sudden arrival, to make trial of
that which every one had before avouched, only Collatinus finds
his wife, though it were late in the night, spinning amongst her
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