| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson by Mark Twain: Dey can't sell _you_ down de river. I hates yo' pappy; he hain't got
no heart--for niggers, he hain't, anyways. I hates him, en I could
kill him!" She paused awhile, thinking; then she burst into wild
sobbings again, and turned away, saying, "Oh, I got to kill my chile,
dey ain't no yuther way--killin' _him_ wouldn't save de chile fum goin'
down de river. Oh, I got to do it, yo' po' mammy's got to kill you to
save you, honey." She gathered her baby to her bosom now, and began to
smother it with caresses. "Mammy's got to kill you--how _kin_ I do it!
But yo' mammy ain't gwine to desert you--no, no, _dah_, don't cry--
she gwine _wid_ you, she gwine to kill herself too. Come along, honey,
come along wid mammy; we gwine to jump in de river, den troubles o' dis
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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 Master Key by L. Frank Baum: by turns, while the other danced and cut capers until he became so
exhausted that he sank down breathless beside his comrade.
"How came you here?" then inquired the boy, in pitying tones.
"We're shipwrecked American sailors from the bark 'Cynthia Jane,'
which went down near here over a month ago," answered the smallest and
thinnest of the two. "We escaped by clinging to a bit of wreckage and
floated to this island, where we have nearly starved to death.
Indeed, we now have eaten everything on the island that was eatable,
and had your boat arrived a few days later you'd have found us lying
dead upon the beach!"
Rob listened to this sad tale with real sympathy.
The Master Key |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Mosses From An Old Manse by Nathaniel Hawthorne: as always at his approach, but now with a different impulse,
"dearest Beatrice, our fate is not yet so desperate. Behold!
there is a medicine, potent, as a wise physician has assured me,
and almost divine in its efficacy. It is composed of ingredients
the most opposite to those by which thy awful father has brought
this calamity upon thee and me. It is distilled of blessed herbs.
Shall we not quaff it together, and thus be purified from evil?"
"Give it me!" said Beatrice, extending her hand to receive the
little silver vial which Giovanni took from his bosom. She added,
with a peculiar emphasis, "I will drink; but do thou await the
result."
Mosses From An Old Manse |
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 Illustrious Gaudissart by Honore de Balzac: would be arrant fools to kill each other for a joke."
"Are you sure the pistols will carry WIDE ENOUGH? I should be sorry to
kill the man, after all," said Gaudissart.
"Sleep in peace," answered Mitouflet, departing.
The next morning the two adversaries, more or less pale, met beside
the bridge of La Cise. The brave Vernier came near shooting a cow
which was peaceably feeding by the roadside.
"Ah, you fired in the air!" cried Gaudissart.
At these words the enemies embraced.
"Monsieur," said the traveller, "your joke was rather rough, but it
was a good one for all that. I am sorry I apostrophized you: I was
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