| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Michael Strogoff by Jules Verne: least disastrously.
"That would not have been so amusing," exclaimed
Nicholas, rubbing his hands, as they disembarked on the
right bank of the river, "if it had not been so difficult."
"That which has only been difficult to us, friend," an-
swered Michael Strogoff, "will, perhaps, be impossible to the
Tartars."
CHAPTER VIII
A HARE CROSSES THE ROAD
MICHAEL STROGOFF might at last hope that the road to
Irkutsk was clear. He had distanced the Tartars, now de-
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe: again, depended on him; and that, if I wasn't quiet, they should
smart for it. Well, you can do anything with a woman, when you've
got her children. He made me submit; he made me be peaceable; he
flattered me with hopes that, perhaps, he would buy them back; and
so things went on, a week or two. One day, I was out walking, and
passed by the calaboose; I saw a crowd about the gate, and heard
a child's voice,--and suddenly my Henry broke away from two or
three men who were holding the poor boy screamed and looked into
my face, and held on to me, until, in tearing him off, they tore
the skirt of my dress half away; and they carried him in, screaming
`Mother! mother! mother!' There was one man stood there seemed to
Uncle Tom's Cabin |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Second Inaugural Address by Abraham Lincoln: ***
These original Project Gutenberg Etexts will be compiled into a file
containing them all, in order to improve the content ratios of Etext
to header material.
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#STARTMARK#
Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address
March 4, 1865
Fellow countrymen: At this second appearing to take the oath
of the presidential office, there is less occasion for an extended
address than there was at the first. Then a statement, somewhat
Second Inaugural Address |
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 Boys' Life of Abraham Lincoln by Helen Nicolay: failure. But it was a weary time, and the outlook was very dark.
The President never despaired. On the most dismal day of the
whole dismal summer of 1862 he sent Secretary Seward to New York
with a confidential letter full of courage, to be shown such of
the governors of free States as could be hastily summoned to meet
him there. In it he said: "I expect to maintain this contest
until successful, or till I die, or am conquered, or my term
expires, or Congress or the country forsake me," and he asked for
100,000 fresh volunteers with which to carry on the war. His
confidence was not misplaced. The governors of eighteen free
States offered him three times the number, and still other calls
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