| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Passionate Pilgrim by William Shakespeare: And yet thou left'st me more than I did crave;
For why I craved nothing of thee still:
O yes, dear friend, I pardon crave of thee,
Thy discontent thou didst bequeath to me.
XI.
Venus, with young Adonis sitting by her
Under a myrtle shade, began to woo him:
She told the youngling how god Mars did try her,
And as he fell to her, so fell she to him.
'Even thus,' quoth she, 'the warlike god embraced me,'
And then she clipp'd Adonis in her arms;
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Cratylus by Plato: since I cannot be satisfied that a name which is incorrectly given is a
name at all.
SOCRATES: Do you admit a name to be the representation of a thing?
CRATYLUS: Yes, I do.
SOCRATES: But do you not allow that some nouns are primitive, and some
derived?
CRATYLUS: Yes, I do.
SOCRATES: Then if you admit that primitive or first nouns are
representations of things, is there any better way of framing
representations than by assimilating them to the objects as much as you
can; or do you prefer the notion of Hermogenes and of many others, who say
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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 King of the Golden River by John Ruskin: it all but a few drops. Then it smiled on him and got up and ran
down the hill; and Gluck looked after it till it became as small
as a little star, and then turned and began climbing again. And
then there were all kinds of sweet flowers growing on the rocks--
bright green moss with pale pink, starry flowers, and soft belled
gentians, more blue than the sky at its deepest, and pure white
transparent lilies. And crimson and purple butterflies darted
hither and thither, and the sky sent down such pure light that Gluck
had never felt so happy in his life.
Yet, when he had climbed for another hour, his thirst became
intolerable again; and when he looked at his bottle, he saw that
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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 Edition of The Ambassadors by Henry James: his mind; dining alone at home, a little stuffily and stupidly, and
waiting on her afterwards to make up his loss. He was sure within a
minute that something had happened; it was so in the air of the rich
little room that he had scarcely to name his thought. Softly lighted,
the whole colour of the place, with its vague values, was in cool
fusion--an effect that made the visitor stand for a little agaze. It
was as if in doing so now he had felt a recent presence--his recognition
of the passage of which his hostess in turn divined. She had scarcely
to say it--"Yes, she has been here, and this time I received her." It
wasn't till a minute later that she added: "There being, as I
understand you, no reason NOW--!"
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