| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from An Ideal Husband by Oscar Wilde: MRS. CHEVELEY. You mean you cannot help doing it. You know you are
standing on the edge of a precipice. And it is not for you to make
terms. It is for you to accept them. Supposing you refuse -
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. What then?
MRS. CHEVELEY. My dear Sir Robert, what then? You are ruined, that
is all! Remember to what a point your Puritanism in England has
brought you. In old days nobody pretended to be a bit better than
his neighbours. In fact, to be a bit better than one's neighbour was
considered excessively vulgar and middle-class. Nowadays, with our
modern mania for morality, every one has to pose as a paragon of
purity, incorruptibility, and all the other seven deadly virtues -
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Agesilaus by Xenophon: his sister Cynisca to rear chariot horses,[9] and thus by her
victory[10] showed that to keep a stud of that sort, however much it
might be a mark of wealth, was hardly a proof of manly virtue. And
surely in the following opinion we may discern plainly the generosity
of him who entertained it. To win victories over private persons in a
chariot race does not add one tittle to a man's renown. He, rather,
who holds his city dear beyond all things else, who has himself sunk
deep into the heart of her affections, who has obtained to himself all
over the world a host of friends and those the noblest, who can outdo
his country and comrades alike in the race of kindliness, and his
antagonists in vengeance--such a man may, in a true sense, be said to
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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 A Sentimental Journey by Laurence Sterne: forerunners, that I might have insisted upon a whole nitch entirely
to myself; - but I should break in upon the confines of the VAIN
Traveller, in wishing to draw attention towards me, till I have
some better grounds for it than the mere NOVELTY OF MY VEHICLE.
It is sufficient for my reader, if he has been a traveller himself,
that with study and reflection hereupon he may be able to determine
his own place and rank in the catalogue; - it will be one step
towards knowing himself; as it is great odds but he retains some
tincture and resemblance, of what he imbibed or carried out, to the
present hour.
The man who first transplanted the grape of Burgundy to the Cape of
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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 The Outlaw of Torn by Edgar Rice Burroughs: horse, and make good your escape." He spoke in French,
and held his hands in the attitude of prayer, so that
he quite entirely misled the ruffians, who had no idea
that he was communicating with the boy.
Norman of Torn could scarce repress a smile at this
clever ruse of the old priest, and, assuming a similar
attitude, he replied in French:
"The good Father Claude does not know Norman of
Torn if he thinks he runs out the back door like an
old woman because a sword looks in at the front door."
Then rising he addressed the ruffians.
The Outlaw of Torn |
