| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Divine Comedy (translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) by Dante Alighieri: When I shall whistle, as our custom is
To do whenever one of us comes out."
Cagnazzo at these words his muzzle lifted,
Shaking his head, and said: "Just hear the trick
Which he has thought of, down to throw himself!"
Whence he, who snares in great abundance had,
Responded: "I by far too cunning am,
When I procure for mine a greater sadness."
Alichin held not in, but running counter
Unto the rest, said to him: "If thou dive,
I will not follow thee upon the gallop,
The Divine Comedy (translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Seraphita by Honore de Balzac: "Enchantments!" cried the pastor shaking the ashes of his pipe into an
earthen-ware dish full of sand, "are there enchantments in these
days?"
"You, who are carefully studying at this moment that volume of the
'Incantations' of Jean Wier, will surely understand the explanation of
my sensations if I try to give it to you," replied Wilfrid. "If we
study Nature attentively in its great evolutions as in its minutest
works, we cannot fail to recognize the possibility of enchantment--
giving to that word its exact significance. Man does not create
forces; he employs the only force that exists and which includes all
others namely Motion, the breath incomprehensible of the sovereign
Seraphita |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from A Footnote to History by Robert Louis Stevenson: government building. The three chiefs had made good haste to
escape; but a considerable booty was made of government papers,
fire-arms, and some seventeen thousand cartridges. Then followed a
scene which long rankled in the minds of the white inhabitants,
when the German marines raided the town in search of Malietoa,
burst into private houses, and were accused (I am willing to
believe on slender grounds) of violence to private persons.
On the morrow, the 25th, one of the German war-ships, which had
been despatched to Leulumoenga over night re-entered the bay,
flying the Tamasese colours at the fore. The new king was given a
royal salute of twenty-one guns, marched through the town by the
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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 New Arabian Nights by Robert Louis Stevenson: turned up so as to conceal his face. You could make out no more of
him than that he was, as I have said, unusually tall, and walked
feebly with a heavy stoop. By his side, and either clinging to him
or giving him support - I could not make out which - was a young,
tall, and slender figure of a woman. She was extremely pale; but
in the light of the lantern her face was so marred by strong and
changing shadows, that she might equally well have been as ugly as
sin or as beautiful as I afterwards found her to be.
When they were just abreast of me, the girl made some remark which
was drowned by the noise of the wind.
"Hush!" said her companion; and there was something in the tone
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