| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Voyage Out by Virginia Woolf: throughout the usual succession of hours. When, on the first day
of her illness, it became clear that she would not be absolutely well,
for her temperature was very high, until Friday, that day
being Tuesday, Terence was filled with resentment, not against her,
but against the force outside them which was separating them.
He counted up the number of days that would almost certainly be
spoilt for them. He realised, with an odd mixture of pleasure
and annoyance, that, for the first time in his life, he was so
dependent upon another person that his happiness was in her keeping.
The days were completely wasted upon trifling, immaterial things,
for after three weeks of such intimacy and intensity all the usual
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Amy Foster by Joseph Conrad: on his passage beheld uncounted multitudes of peo-
ple--whole nations--all dressed in such clothes as
the rich wear. Once he was made to get out of the
carriage, and slept through a night on a bench in
a house of bricks with his bundle under his head;
and once for many hours he had to sit on a floor of
flat stones dozing, with his knees up and with his
bundle between his feet. There was a roof over him,
which seemed made of glass, and was so high that
the tallest mountain-pine he had ever seen would
have had room to grow under it. Steam-machines
Amy Foster |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from McTeague by Frank Norris: other, and the whole flat knows it; and you two have been
living here side by side year in and year out, and you've
never said a word to each other. It's all nonsense. Now, I
want you should go right in and speak to her just as soon as
she comes home, and say you've come into money and you want
her to marry you."
"Impossible--impossible!" exclaimed the old Englishman,
alarmed and perturbed. "It's quite out of the question. I
wouldn't presume."
"Well, do you love her, or not?"
"Really, Mrs. McTeague, I--I--you must excuse me. It's a
McTeague |
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 Lysis by Plato: Friendship; Cic. de Amicitia.)
LYSIS, OR FRIENDSHIP
by
Plato
Translated by Benjamin Jowett
PERSONS OF THE DIALOGUE: Socrates, who is the narrator, Menexenus,
Hippothales, Lysis, Ctesippus.
SCENE: A newly-erected Palaestra outside the walls of Athens.
I was going from the Academy straight to the Lyceum, intending to take the
outer road, which is close under the wall. When I came to the postern gate
of the city, which is by the fountain of Panops, I fell in with
Lysis |
