| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Daughter of Eve by Honore de Balzac: own Bohemian life all who allow themselves to be caught in the frantic
whirl of its gay spirits, its eager abandonment, and its contemptuous
indifference to the future.
Though this Bohemian life displayed itself in her house in tumultuous
disorder, amid the laughter of artists of every description, the queen
of the revels had ten fingers on which she knew better how to count
than any of her guests. In that house secret saturnalias of literature
and art, politics and finance were carried on; there, desire reigned a
sovereign; there, caprice and fancy were as sacred as honor and virtue
to a bourgeoise; thither came Blondet, Finot, Etienne Lousteau, Vernou
the feuilletonist, Couture, Bixiou, Rastignac in his earlier days,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Ann Veronica by H. G. Wells: same; and Mr. Goopes said that we must distinguish between
sincerity and irony, which was often indeed no more than
sincerity at the sublimated level.
Alderman Dunstable said that sincerity was often a matter of
opportunity, and illustrated the point to the fair young man with
an anecdote about Blinders on the Dust Destructor Committee,
during which the young man in the orange tie succeeded in giving
the whole discussion a daring and erotic flavor by questioning
whether any one could be perfectly sincere in love.
Miss Miniver thought that there was no true sincerity except in
love, and appealed to Ann Veronica, but the young man in the
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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 Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane: lessons of yesterday had been that retribution
was a laggard and blind. With these facts before
him he did not deem it necessary that he should
become feverish over the possibilities of the
ensuing twenty-four hours. He could leave
much to chance. Besides, a faith in himself had
secretly blossomed. There was a little flower of
confidence growing within him. He was now a
man of experience. He had been out among the
dragons, he said, and he assured himself that they
were not so hideous as he had imagined them.
The Red Badge of Courage |
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 Finished by H. Rider Haggard: so weary that I could not attempt to eat. Next morning as I was
finishing my breakfast in the little fenced courtyard of this
guest-hut, Goza appeared and said that the king commanded me to
be brought to him at once, adding that I must "speak softly" to
him, as he was "very angry."
So off we went across the great cattle kraal where a regiment of
young men, two thousand strong or so, were drilling with a fierce
intensity which showed they knew that they were out for more than
exercise. About the sides of the kraal also stood hundreds of
soldiers, all of them talking and, it seemed to me, excited, for
they stamped upon the ground and even jumped into the air to give
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