| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte: cannot accomplish!"
"I have an answer for you--hear it. I have watched you ever since
we first met: I have made you my study for ten months. I have
proved you in that time by sundry tests: and what have I seen and
elicited? In the village school I found you could perform well,
punctually, uprightly, labour uncongenial to your habits and
inclinations; I saw you could perform it with capacity and tact:
you could win while you controlled. In the calm with which you
learnt you had become suddenly rich, I read a mind clear of the vice
of Demas:- lucre had no undue power over you. In the resolute
readiness with which you cut your wealth into four shares, keeping
Jane Eyre |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The King of the Golden River by John Ruskin: despair. "Water!" he stretched his arms to Hans, and cried
feebly, "Water! I am dying."
"I have none," replied Hans; "thou hast had thy share of
life." He strode over the prostrate body and darted on. And a
flash of blue lightning rose out of the East, shaped like a sword;
it shook thrice over the whole heaven and left it dark with one
heavy, impenetrable shade. The sun was setting; it plunged towards
the horizon like a redhot ball.
The roar of the Golden River rose on Hans's ear. He stood
at the brink of the chasm through which it ran. Its waves were
filled with the red glory of the sunset; they shook their crests
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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 La Grenadiere by Honore de Balzac: sweet, childish voices, the grace of their movements, the promise in
their faces, the innate something that told of careful training from
the cradle? They seemed as if they had never shed tears nor wailed
like other children. Their mother knew, as it were, by electrically
swift intuition, the desires and the pains which she anticipated and
relieved. She seemed to dread a complaint from one of them more than
the loss of her soul. Everything in her children did honor to their
mother's training. Their threefold life, seemingly one life, called up
vague, fond thoughts; it was like a vision of the dreamed-of bliss of
a better world. And the three, so attuned to each other, lived in
truth such a life as one might picture for them at first sight--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 Macbeth by William Shakespeare: Thou know'st, that Banquo and his Fleans liues
Lady. But in them, Natures Coppie's not eterne
Macb. There's comfort yet, they are assaileable,
Then be thou iocund: ere the Bat hath flowne
His Cloyster'd flight, ere to black Heccats summons
The shard-borne Beetle, with his drowsie hums,
Hath rung Nights yawning Peale,
There shall be done a deed of dreadfull note
Lady. What's to be done?
Macb. Be innocent of the knowledge, dearest Chuck,
Till thou applaud the deed: Come, seeling Night,
Macbeth |
