| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen: could have done so: and then, too, I smell so deliciously, for close before
the gate bloom the most beautiful roses."
* Corsor, on the Great Belt, called, formerly, before the introduction of
steam-vessels, when travellers were often obliged to wait a long time for a
favorable wind, "the most tiresome of towns." The poet Baggesen was born here.
Little Tuk looked, and all was red and green before his eyes; but as soon as
the confusion of colors was somewhat over, all of a sudden there appeared a
wooded slope close to the bay, and high up above stood a magnificent old
church, with two high pointed towers. From out the hill-side spouted fountains
in thick streams of water, so that there was a continual splashing; and close
beside them sat an old king with a golden crown upon his white head: that was
Fairy Tales |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum: once the great assemblage hushed as if by magic. The biggest of
the tigers came up to the Lion and bowed, saying:
"Welcome, O King of Beasts! You have come in good time to
fight our enemy and bring peace to all the animals of the forest
once more."
"What is your trouble?" asked the Lion quietly.
"We are all threatened," answered the tiger, "by a fierce
enemy which has lately come into this forest. It is a most
tremendous monster, like a great spider, with a body as big as an
elephant and legs as long as a tree trunk. It has eight of these
long legs, and as the monster crawls through the forest he seizes
The Wizard of Oz |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Essays & Lectures by Oscar Wilde: pious people.
But perhaps there is no passage in the whole of ancient and modern
history which breathes such a manly and splendid spirit of
rationalism as one preserved to us in the Vatican - strange
resting-place for it! - in which he treats of the terrible decay of
population which had fallen on his native land in his own day, and
which by the general orthodox public was regarded as a special
judgment of God sending childlessness on women as a punishment for
the sins of the people. For it was a disaster quite without
parallel in the history of the land, and entirely unforeseen by any
of its political-economy writers who, on the contrary, were always
|
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 Herland by Charlotte Gilman: "Oh, no," he laughed. "The man keeps his own and gives it to her, too."
"Then she just loses hers and takes a new one--how unpleasant!
We won't do that!" Alima said decidedly.
Terry was good-humored about it. "I don't care what you do
or don't do so long as we have that wedding pretty soon," he said,
reaching a strong brown hand after Alima's, quite as brown and
nearly as strong.
"As to giving us things--of course we can see that you'd like to,
but we are glad you can't," Celis continued. "You see, we love you
just for yourselves--we wouldn't want you to--to pay anything.
Isn't it enough to know that you are loved personally--and just as men?"
Herland |
