| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Beauty and The Beast by Bayard Taylor: ascendancy of Good in the government of the world.
Laying aside the book, I fell into a speculation concerning the
mixture of the two elements in man's nature. The life of an
individual is usually, it seemed to me, a series of
RESULTS, the processes leading to which are not often visible,
or observed when they are so. Each act is the precipitation of a
number of mixed influences, more or less unconsciously felt; the
qualities of good and evil are so blended therein that they defy
the keenest moral analysis; and how shall we, then, pretend to
judge of any one? Perhaps the surest indication of evil (I further
reflected) is that it always tries to conceal itself, and the
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Pivot of Civilization by Margaret Sanger: is broken down, as psychology becomes an ally of physiology and
biology, and biology joins hands with physics and chemistry, we are
taught to see that there is a mysterious unity between these inner and
outer forces. They express themselves in accordance with the same
structural, physical and chemical laws. The development of
civilization in the subjective world, in the sphere of behavior,
conduct and morality, has been precisely the gradual accumulation and
popularization of methods which teach people how to direct, transform
and transmute the driving power of the great natural forces.
Psychology is now recognizing the forces concealed in the human
organism. In the long process of adaptation to social life, men have
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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 Father Damien by Robert Louis Stevenson: cried, "if the story were a thousand times true, can't you see you
are a million times a lower ----- for daring to repeat it?" I wish
it could be told of you that when the report reached you in your
house, perhaps after family worship, you had found in your soul
enough holy anger to receive it with the same expressions; ay, even
with that one which I dare not print; it would not need to have
been blotted away, like Uncle Toby's oath, by the tears of the
recording angel; it would have been counted to you for your
brightest righteousness. But you have deliberately chosen the part
of the man from Honolulu, and you have played it with improvements
of your own. The man from Honolulu - miserable, leering creature -
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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 Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad: bowl, a casket of black wood, bottles of marking ink, and rubber
stamps; a few books, with titles hinting at impropriety; a few
apparently old copies of obscure newspapers, badly printed, with
titles like THE TORCH, THE GONG - rousing titles. And the two gas
jets inside the panes were always turned low, either for economy's
sake or for the sake of the customers.
These customers were either very young men, who hung about the
window for a time before slipping in suddenly; or men of a more
mature age, but looking generally as if they were not in funds.
Some of that last kind had the collars of their overcoats turned
right up to their moustaches, and traces of mud on the bottom of
The Secret Agent |
