| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Voyage to Abyssinia by Father Lobo: the commission, gave me many distinguishing proofs of his affection
to me, and of his zeal for the Catholic religion. It was a journey
of fifteen days through part of the country possessed by the Galles,
which made it necessary to take troops with us for our security;
yet, notwithstanding this precaution, the hazard of the expedition
appeared so great, that our friends bid us farewell with tears, and
looked upon us as destined to unavoidable destruction. The viceroy
had given orders to some troops to join us on the road, so that our
little army grew stronger as we advanced. There is no making long
marches in this country; an army here is a great city well peopled
and under exact government: they take their wives and children with
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Pericles by William Shakespeare: SECOND FISHERMAN.
Nay, then thou wilt starve, sure; for here's nothing to be got
now-a-days, unless thou canst fish for 't.
PERICLES.
What I have been I have forgot to know;
But what I am, want teaches me to think on:
A man throng'd up with cold: my veins are chill,
And have no more of life than may suffice
To give my tongue that heat to ask your help;
Which if you shall refuse, when I am dead,
For that I am a man, pray see me buried.
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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 Wrecker by Stevenson & Osbourne: gaze upon the changing east, the fading lenses, the smokeless
city, and the many-armed and many-masted harbour growing
slowly clear under his eyes. His bed-fellows (so to call them)
were less active; they lay sprawled upon the grass and benches,
the dingy men, the frowsy women, prolonging their late repose;
and Carthew wandered among the sleeping bodies alone, and
cursed the incurable stupidity of his behaviour. Day brought a
new society of nursery-maids and children, and fresh-dressed
and (I am sorry to say) tight-laced maidens, and gay people in
rich traps; upon the skirts of which Carthew and "the other
blackguards"--his own bitter phrase--skulked, and chewed
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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 Concerning Christian Liberty by Martin Luther: since I am very conscious myself of the great beam in my own eye,
nor can I be the first to cast a stone at the adulteress.
I have indeed inveighed sharply against impious doctrines, and I
have not been slack to censure my adversaries on account, not of
their bad morals, but of their impiety. And for this I am so far
from being sorry that I have brought my mind to despise the
judgments of men and to persevere in this vehement zeal,
according to the example of Christ, who, in His zeal, calls His
adversaries a generation of vipers, blind, hypocrites, and
children of the devil. Paul, too, charges the sorcerer with being
a child of the devil, full of all subtlety and all malice; and
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