| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Essays & Lectures by Oscar Wilde: do, to a fabulous age of innocent happiness, a BELL' ETE DELL'
AURO, where sin and death were unknown and men and women were like
Gods, the foremost men of intellect such as Aristotle and Plato,
AEschylus and many of the other poets (1) saw in primitive man 'a
few small sparks of humanity preserved on the tops of mountains
after some deluge,' 'without an idea of cities, governments or
legislation,' 'living the lives of wild beasts in sunless caves,'
'their only law being the survival of the fittest.'
And this, too, was the opinion of Thucydides, whose ARCHAEOLOGIA as
it is contains a most valuable disquisition on the early condition
of Hellas, which it will be necessary to examine at some length.
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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 Firm of Nucingen by Honore de Balzac: republic or monarchy down their throats; even if the loan has been
floated, as Couture says, to pay the interest on that very same
national debt. Nobody can complain. These are the real principles of
the present Golden Age."
"When the stage machinery is so huge," continued Bixiou, "a good many
puppets are required. In the first place, Nucingen had purposely and
with his eyes open invested his five millions in an American
investment, foreseeing that the profits would not come in until it was
too late. The firm of Nucingen deliberately emptied its coffers. Any
liquidation ought to be brought about naturally. In deposits belonging
to private individuals and other investments, the firm possessed about
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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 United States Constitution: open all the Certificates, and the Votes shall then be counted.
The Person having the greatest Number of Votes shall be the President,
if such Number be a Majority of the whole Number of Electors appointed;
and if there be more than one who have such Majority, and have an equal
Number of votes, then the House of Representatives shall immediately
chuse by Ballot one of them for President; and if no Person have
a Majority, then from the five highest on the List the said House
shall in like Manner chuse the President. But in chusing the President,
the Votes shall be taken by States, the Representation from each State
having one Vote; a Quorum for this Purpose shall consist of a Member
or Members from two thirds of the States, and a Majority of all the
The United States Constitution |
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 Call of the Wild by Jack London: enough in the Southland, under the law of love and fellowship, to
respect private property and personal feelings; but in the
Northland, under the law of club and fang, whoso took such things
into account was a fool, and in so far as he observed them he
would fail to prosper.
Not that Buck reasoned it out. He was fit, that was all, and
unconsciously he accommodated himself to the new mode of life.
All his days, no matter what the odds, he had never run from a
fight. But the club of the man in the red sweater had beaten into
him a more fundamental and primitive code. Civilized, he could
have died for a moral consideration, say the defence of Judge
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