| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Phantasmagoria and Other Poems by Lewis Carroll: Trampling, with heel that will not spare,
The vermin that beset her path!
Go, throng each other's drawing-rooms,
Ye idols of a petty clique:
Strut your brief hour in borrowed plumes,
And make your penny-trumpets squeak.
Deck your dull talk with pilfered shreds
Of learning from a nobler time,
And oil each other's little heads
With mutual Flattery's golden slime:
And when the topmost height ye gain,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Dreams by Olive Schreiner: He must follow it, though none else sees the tracing."
"Love?"
He said, "He shall hunger for it--but he shall not find it. When he
stretches out his arms to it, and would lay his heart against a thing he
loves, then, far off along the horizon he shall see a light play. He must
go towards it. The thing he loves will not journey with him; he must
travel alone. When he presses somewhat to his burning heart, crying,
'Mine, mine, my own!' he shall hear a voice--'Renounce! renounce! this is
not thine!'"
"He shall succeed?"
He said, "He shall fail. When he runs with others they shall reach the
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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 The Alkahest by Honore de Balzac: others placed about the salons, were the product of the patient
researches of three centuries. Among them were choice specimens of
Rubens, Ruysdael, Vandyke, Terburg, Gerard Dow, Teniers, Mieris, Paul
Potter, Wouvermans, Rembrandt, Hobbema, Cranach, and Holbein. French
and Italian pictures were in a minority, but all were authentic and
masterly.
Another generation had fancied Chinese and Japanese porcelains: this
Claes was eager after rare furniture, that one for silver-ware; in
fact, each and all had their mania, their passion,--a trait which
belongs in a striking degree to the Flemish character. The father of
Balthazar, a last relic of the once famous Dutch society, left behind
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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 Egmont by Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe: ancient rights afford, doubtless, convenient loopholes, through which the
crafty and the powerful may creep, and wherein they may lie concealed, to
the injury of the people and of the entire community; and it is on this
account, I fear, that they are held in such high esteem.
Egmont. And these arbitrary changes, these unlimited encroachments of
the supreme power, are they not indications that one will permit himself to
do what is forbidden to thousands? The monarch would alone be free, that
he may have it in his power to gratify his every wish, to realize his every
thought. And though we should confide in him as a good and virtuous
sovereign, will he be answerable to us for his successor? That none who
come after him shall rule without consideration, without forbearance! And
Egmont |
