| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad: wild and passionate uproar. Ugly. Yes, it was ugly enough;
but if you were man enough you would admit to yourself
that there ywas in you just the faintest trace of a response
to the terrible frankness of that noise, a dim suspicion
of there being a meaning in it which you--you so remote from
the night of first ages--could comprehend. And why not?
The mind of man is capable of anything--because everything is in it,
all the past as well as all the future. What was there after all?
Joy, fear, sorrow, devotion, valour, rage--who can tell?--
but truth--truth stripped of its cloak of time. Let the fool
gape and shudder--the man knows, and can look on without a wink.
Heart of Darkness |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Scarecrow of Oz by L. Frank Baum: "Why, we've come to the end of our travels, I guess,"
he replied.
"Is the hole blocked?" inquired the Ork.
"No; it's wuss nor that," replied Cap'n Bill sadly.
"I'm on the edge of a precipice. Wait a minute an' I'll
move along and let you see for yourselves. Be careful,
Trot, not to fall."
Then he crept forward a little and moved to one side,
holding the candle so that the girl could see to follow
him. The Ork came next and now all three knelt on a
narrow ledge of rock which dropped straight away and
The Scarecrow of Oz |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Voice of the City by O. Henry: on the tower, shimmered in the clear light of her
namesake in the sky. Along came my poet, hurry-
ing, hatted, haired, emitting dactyls, spondees and
dactylis. I seized him.
"Bill," said I (in the magazine he is Cleon), "give
me a lift. I am on an assignment to find out the
Voice of the city. You see, it's a special order. Ordi-
narily a symposium comprising the views of Henry
Clews, John L. Sullivan, Edwin Markham, May Ir-
win and Charles Schwab would be about all. But this
is a different matter. We want a broad, poetic,
The Voice of the City |
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 Polly of the Circus by Margaret Mayo: was so carried away by her own eloquence and so busy showing
Julia the sights beyond the window, that she did not hear Miss
Perkins, the thin-lipped spinster, who entered, followed by the
Widow Willoughby dragging her seven-year-old son Willie by the
hand.
The women were protesting because their choir practice of "What
Shall the Harvest Be?" had been interrupted by the unrequested
acompaniment{sic} of the "hoochie coochie" from the nearby circus
band.
"It's scandalous!" Miss Perkins snapped. "Scandalous! And
SOMEBODY ought to stop it." She glanced about with an
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