| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Village Rector by Honore de Balzac: her. She may have made a Paul of some young man who caught her eye,
merely to fasten her wild ideas on an actual being, as the mists of a
damp atmosphere, touched by frost, crystallize on the branches of a
tree by the wayside. She must have flung herself deep into the abysses
of her dream, for though she often returned bearing on her brow, as if
from vast heights, some luminous reflections, oftener she seemed to
carry in her hand the flowers that grew beside a torrent she had
followed down a precipice.
On the warm summer evenings she would ask her father to take her on
his arm to the banks of the Vienne, where she went into ecstasies over
the beauties of the sky and fields, the glories of the setting sun, or
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The United States Constitution: New Jersey four, Pennsylvania eight, Delaware one, Maryland six,
Virginia ten, North Carolina five, South Carolina five, and Georgia three.
When vacancies happen in the Representation from any State, the Executive
Authority thereof shall issue Writs of Election to fill such Vacancies.
The House of Representatives shall chuse their Speaker and other Officers;
and shall have the sole Power of Impeachment.
Section 3. The Senate of the United States shall be composed of
two Senators from each State, chosen by the legislature thereof,
for six Years; and each Senator shall have one Vote.
Immediately after they shall be assembled in Consequence of the first Election,
they shall be divided as equally as may be into three Classes. The Seats of
The United States Constitution |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Princess by Alfred Tennyson: That holds a stately fretwork to the Sun,
And followed up by a hundred airy does,
Steps with a tender foot, light as on air,
The lovely, lordly creature floated on
To where her wounded brethren lay; there stayed;
Knelt on one knee,--the child on one,--and prest
Their hands, and called them dear deliverers,
And happy warriors, and immortal names,
And said 'You shall not lie in the tents but here,
And nursed by those for whom you fought, and served
With female hands and hospitality.'
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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 Hiero by Xenophon: For instance, how sweet the responsive glance of love for love; how
sweet the questions and the answers;[43] and, most sweet of all, most
love-enkindling, the battles and the strifes of faithful lovers.[44]
But to enjoy[45] one's love perforce (he added) resembles more an act
of robbery, in my judgment, than love's pastime. And, indeed, the
robber derives some satisfaction from the spoils he wins and from the
pain he causes to the man he hates. But to seek pleasure in the pain
of one we love devoutly, to kiss and to be hated, to touch[46] and to
be loathed--can one conceive a state of things more odious or more
pitiful? For, it is a certainty, the ordinary person may accept at
once each service rendered by the object of his love as a sign and
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