| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Glimpses of the Moon by Edith Wharton: questioned, laying a brotherly hand on hers.
She stared at him a moment, and sprang up clumsily from her
chair. "I was never young ... if that's what you mean. It's
lucky, isn't it, that my parents gave me such a grand education?
Because, you see, art's a wonderful resource." (She pronounced
it RE-source.)
He continued to look at her kindly. "You won't need it--or any
other--when you grow young, as you will some day," he assured
her.
"Do you mean, when I fall in love? But I am in love--Oh,
there's Eldorada and Mr. Beck!" She broke off with a jerk,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Voyage to Arcturus by David Lindsay: more essential, because I keep on displeasing you with my remarks,
and that means I have not yet learned my lesson properly."
"Do not be humble, for humility is only self-judgment, and while we
are thinking of self, we must be neglecting some action we could be
planning or shaping in our mind."
Tydomin continued to be uneasy and preoccupied.
"Why was Maskull not in the picture?" she asked.
"You dwell on this foreboding because you imagine it is tragical.
There is nothing tragical in death, Tydomin, nor in life. There is
only right and wrong. What arises from right or wrong action does
not matter. We are not gods, constructing a world, but simple men
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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 In Darkest England and The Way Out by General William Booth: prepared to maintain against all comers that it is possible for an
industrious man to grow his rations, provided he is given a spade with
which to dig and land to dig in. Especially will this be the case with
intelligent direction and the advantages of co-operation.
Is it not a reasonable supposition? It always seems to me a strange
thing that men should insist that you must first transport your
labourer thousands of miles to a desolate, bleak country in order to
set him to work to extract a livelihood from the soil when hundreds of
thousands of acres lie only half tilled at home or not tilled at all.
Is it reasonable to think that you can only begin to make a living out
of land when it lies several thousand miles from the nearest market,
In Darkest England and The Way Out |
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 Prince by Nicolo Machiavelli: reigned successfully; for his valour made him so much admired in the
sight of the soldiers and people that the latter were kept in a way
astonished and awed and the former respectful and satisfied. And
because the actions of this man, as a new prince, were great, I wish
to show briefly that he knew well how to counterfeit the fox and the
lion, which natures, as I said above, it is necessary for a prince to
imitate.
Knowing the sloth of the Emperor Julian, he persuaded the army in
Sclavonia, of which he was captain, that it would be right to go to
Rome and avenge the death of Pertinax, who had been killed by the
praetorian soldiers; and under this pretext, without appearing to
The Prince |
