| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Return of Tarzan by Edgar Rice Burroughs: For several minutes he lay listening. They were coming
in the direction of the amphitheater.
Tarzan arose lazily and stretched himself. His keen ears
followed every movement of the advancing tribe. They were
upwind, and presently he caught their scent, though he had
not needed this added evidence to assure him that he was right.
As they came closer to the amphitheater Tarzan of the Apes
melted into the branches upon the other side of the arena.
There he waited to inspect the newcomers. Nor had he long
to wait.
Presently a fierce, hairy face appeared among the lower
The Return of Tarzan |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Night and Day by Virginia Woolf: facts from his grasp, and gave him a strange sense of distance, even
from the material shapes of wall and window by which he was
surrounded. The prospect of the future, now that the strength of his
passion was revealed to him, appalled him.
The marriage would take place in September, she had said; that allowed
him, then, six full months in which to undergo these terrible extremes
of emotion. Six months of torture, and after that the silence of the
grave, the isolation of the insane, the exile of the damned; at best,
a life from which the chief good was knowingly and for ever excluded.
An impartial judge might have assured him that his chief hope of
recovery lay in this mystic temper, which identified a living woman
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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 Eugenie Grandet by Honore de Balzac: are worth about six hundred francs."
"Say t-t-twelve hundred, be-c-cause there's three or four hundred
francs on the second crop. Well, then, c-c-calculate that t-twelve
thousand francs a year for f-f-forty years with interest c-c-comes
to--"
"Say sixty thousand francs," said the notary.
"I am willing; c-c-comes t-t-to sixty th-th-thousand. Very good,"
continued Grandet, without stuttering: "two thousand poplars forty
years old will only yield me fifty thousand francs. There's a loss. I
have found that myself," said Grandet, getting on his high horse.
"Jean, fill up all the holes except those at the bank of the river;
Eugenie Grandet |
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 Tom Sawyer, Detective by Mark Twain: us again, and just couldn't seem to get enough of it,
she was so glad to see us; and she says:
"Where HAVE you been a-loafing to, you good-for-nothing
trash! I've been that worried about you I didn't know what
to do. Your traps has been here ever so long, and I've
had supper cooked fresh about four times so as to have it
hot and good when you come, till at last my patience is
just plumb wore out, and I declare I--I--why I could skin
you alive! You must be starving, poor things!--set down,
set down, everybody; don't lose no more time."
It was good to be there again behind all that noble
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