| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy: not to have asked you to bring me in here. Oh, I oughtn't! I see it now.
My curiosity to hunt up a new sensation always leads me into these scrapes.
Forgive me! ... You will, won't you, Jude?"
The appeal was so remorseful that Jude's eyes were even wetter
than hers as he pressed her hand for Yes.
"Now we'll hurry away, and I won't do it any more!"
she continued humbly; and they came out of the building,
Sue intending to go on to the station to meet Phillotson.
But the first person they encountered on entering the main
street was the schoolmaster himself, whose train had arrived
sooner than Sue expected. There was nothing really to demur
Jude the Obscure |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Chance by Joseph Conrad: and a manner of concealing one's terror of such things. Prisons are
wonderful contrivances. Shut--open. Very neat. Shut--open. And
out comes some sort of corpse, to wander awfully in a world in which
it has no possible connections and carrying with it the appalling
tainted atmosphere of its silent abode. Marvellous arrangement. It
works automatically, and, when you look at it, the perfection makes
you sick; which for a mere mechanism is no mean triumph. Sick and
scared. It had nearly scared that poor girl to her death. Fancy
having to take such a thing by the hand! Now I understood the
remorseful strain I had detected in her speeches.
"By Jove!" I said. "They are about to let him out! I never thought
Chance |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Hunting of the Snark by Lewis Carroll: Dressed in gown, bands, and wig, was defending a pig
On the charge of deserting its sty.
The Witnesses proved, without error or flaw,
That the sty was deserted when found:
And the Judge kept explaining the state of the law
In a soft under-current of sound.
The indictment had never been clearly expressed,
And it seemed that the Snark had begun,
And had spoken three hours, before any one guessed
What the pig was supposed to have done.
The Jury had each formed a different view
The Hunting of the Snark |
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 My Aunt Margaret's Mirror by Walter Scott: When these heaven-born sounds had ceased, a door opened in the
upper end of the apartment, and they saw Damiotti, standing at
the head of two or three steps, sign to them to advance. His
dress was so different from that which he had worn a few minutes
before, that they could hardly recognize him; and the deadly
paleness of his countenance, and a certain stern rigidity of
muscles, like that of one whose mind is made up to some strange
and daring action, had totally changed the somewhat sarcastic
expression with which he had previously regarded them both, and
particularly Lady Bothwell. He was barefooted, excepting a
species of sandals in the antique fashion; his legs were naked
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