| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from La Grenadiere by Honore de Balzac: measure glad that he should ask; the boy's astonished masters had told
her that he was overworking himself. So Louis went for long walks. He
tried to inure himself to fatigue, climbed the tallest trees with
incredible quickness, learned to swim, watched through the night. He
was not like the same boy; he was a young man already, with a
sunburned face, and a something in his expression that told of deep
purpose.
When October came, Mme. Willemsens could only rise at noon. The
sunshine, reflected by the surface of the Loire, and stored up by the
rocks, raised the temperature of the air till it was almost as warm
and soft as the atmosphere of the Bay of Naples, for which reason 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 The Hated Son by Honore de Balzac: rich clothing of those courtly dames. Between the destruction of his
son and a mesalliance, every other father would have hesitated, but in
this uncontrollable old man ferocity was the power which had so far
solved the difficulties of life for him; he drew his sword in all
cases, as the only remedy that he knew for the gordian knots of life.
Under present circumstances, when the convulsion of his ideas had
reached its height, the nature of the man came uppermost. Twice
detected in flagrant falsehood by the being he abhorred, the son he
cursed, cursing him more than ever in this supreme moment when that
son's despised, and to him most despicable, weakness triumphed over
his own omnipotence, infallible till then, the father and the man
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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 Republic by Plato: lower, and middle notes of the scale, and the intermediate intervals--when
he has bound all these together, and is no longer many, but has become one
entirely temperate and perfectly adjusted nature, then he proceeds to act,
if he has to act, whether in a matter of property, or in the treatment of
the body, or in some affair of politics or private business; always
thinking and calling that which preserves and co-operates with this
harmonious condition, just and good action, and the knowledge which
presides over it, wisdom, and that which at any time impairs this
condition, he will call unjust action, and the opinion which presides over
it ignorance.
You have said the exact truth, Socrates.
The Republic |
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 Young Forester by Zane Grey: right. On the sunny southern slopes I saw trees that dwarfed the ones on
the colder and shady north sides. I also found many small pines and
seedlings growing in warm, protected places. This showed me the value of
the sun to a forest. Though I kept a lookout for deer or game of any kind,
I saw nothing except some black squirrels with white tails. They were
beautiful and very tame, and one was nibbling at what I concluded must have
been a seed from a pine-cone.
Presently I fancied that I espied a moving speck far down through the
forest glades. I stopped Hal, and, watching closely, soon made certain of
it. Then it became lost for a time, but reappeared again somewhat closer.
It was like a brown blur and scarcely moved. I reined Hal more to the
The Young Forester |
