| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Songs of Innocence and Experience by William Blake: Nor ever once wish from the Church to stray.
Then the Parson might preach, and drink, and sing,
And we'd be as happy as birds in the spring;
And modest Dame Lurch, who is always at church,
Would not have bandy children, nor fasting, nor birch.
And God, like a father, rejoicing to see
His children as pleasant and happy as He,
Would have no more quarrel with the Devil or the barrel,
But kiss him, and give him both drink and apparel.
LONDON
I wander through each chartered street,
Songs of Innocence and Experience |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Caesar's Commentaries in Latin by Julius Caesar: decumana porta castra munita facilemque aditum habere.
Crassus equitum praefectos cohortatus, ut magnis praemiis
pollicitationibusque suos excitarent, quid fieri vellet ostendit. Illi,
ut erat imperatum, eductis iis cohortibus quae praesidio castris relictae
intritae ab labore erant, et longiore itinere circumductis, ne ex hostium
castris conspici possent, omnium oculis mentibusque ad pugnam intentis
celeriter ad eas quas diximus munitiones pervenerunt atque his prorutis
prius in hostium castris constiterunt quam plane ab his videri aut quid
rei gereretur cognosci posset. Tum vero clamore ab ea parte audito nostri
redintegratis viribus, quod plerumque in spe victoriae accidere consuevit,
acrius impugnare coeperunt. Hostes undique circumventi desperatis omnibus
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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 Mother by Owen Wister: me what in those old days six years ago was still a large amount. To-day
we understand what true riches mean. But in those bygone times six years
ago, a million dollars was a sum considerable enough to be still seen, as
it were, with the naked eye. That was my bequest from Uncle Godfrey, and
I felt myself to be the possessor of a fortune."
At this point in Richard's narrative, a sigh escaped from Ethel.
"I know," he immediately said, "that money is always welcome. But it is
certainly some consolation to reflect how slight a loss a million dollars
is counted to-day in New York. And I did not lose all of it."
"I met Ethel at the train on her return from Florida, and crossed with
her on the ferry from Jersey City to Desbrosses Street. There I was
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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 Reef by Edith Wharton: blonde beauty of the 'sixties. Darrow wondered that Fraser
Leath's filial respect should have prevailed over his
aesthetic scruples to the extent of permitting such an
anachronism among the eighteenth century graces of Givre;
but a moment's reflection made it clear that, to its late
owner, the attitude would have seemed exactly in the
traditions of the place.
Madame de Chantelle's emergence from an inner room snatched
Darrow from these irrelevant musings. She was already
beaded and bugled for the evening, and, save for a slight
pinkness of the eye-lids, her elaborate appearance revealed
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