| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Z. Marcas by Honore de Balzac: lay in the most serious facts of the politics of the time. Juste and I
could not see any room for us in the two professions our parents
wished us to take up. There are a hundred doctors, a hundred lawyers,
for one that is wanted. The crowd is choking these two paths which are
supposed to lead to fortune, but which are merely two arenas; men kill
each other there, fighting, not indeed with swords or fire-arms, but
with intrigue and calumny, with tremendous toil, campaigns in the
sphere of the intellect as murderous as those in Italy were to the
soldiers of the Republic. In these days, when everything is an
intellectual competition, a man must be able to sit forty-eight hours
on end in his chair before a table, as a General could remain for two
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Smalcald Articles by Dr. Martin Luther: and princes, who will neither preach, nor teach, nor baptize,
nor administer the Lord's Supper, nor perform any work or
office of the Church, and, moreover, persecute and condemn
those who discharge these functions, having been called to do
so, the Church ought not on their account to remain without
ministers [to be forsaken by or deprived of ministers].
Therefore, as the ancient examples of the Church and the
Fathers teach us, we ourselves will and ought to ordain
suitable persons to this office; and, even according to their
own laws, they have not the right to forbid or prevent us. For
their laws say that those ordained even by heretics should be
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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 Dracula by Bram Stoker: Arthur looked up with set white face and said, "Take care, sir, take care!"
"Would it not be well to hear what I have to say?" said Van Helsing.
"And then you will at least know the limit of my purpose.
Shall I go on?"
"That's fair enough," broke in Morris.
After a pause Van Helsing went on, evidently with an effort, "Miss Lucy
is dead, is it not so? Yes! Then there can be no wrong to her.
But if she be not dead. . ."
Arthur jumped to his feet, "Good God!" he cried. "What do you mean?
Has there been any mistake, has she been buried alive?"
He groaned in anguish that not even hope could soften.
Dracula |
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 A Voyage to Arcturus by David Lindsay: There, we will pray."
"And what then?"
"If you are truehearted, you will see things you will not easily
forget."
They had been walking slightly uphill in a sort of trough between two
parallel, gently sloping downs. The trough now deepened, while the
hills on either side grew steeper. They were in an ascending valley
and, as it curved this way and that, the landscape was shut off from
view. They came to a little spring, bubbling up from the ground. It
formed a trickling brook, which was unlike all other brooks in that
it was flowing up the valley instead of down. Before long it was
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