| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Art of Writing by Robert Louis Stevenson: know it; for it is in this world as it is, and not in a world
made easy by educational suppressions, that he must win his
way to shame or glory. In one word, it must always be foul
to tell what is false; and it can never be safe to suppress
what is true. The very fact that you omit may be the fact
which somebody was wanting, for one man's meat is another
man's poison, and I have known a person who was cheered by
the perusal of CANDIDE. Every fact is a part of that great
puzzle we must set together; and none that comes directly in
a writer's path but has some nice relations, unperceivable by
him, to the totality and bearing of the subject under hand.
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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 Manon Lescaut by Abbe Prevost: reckoned upon being able to live with my mistress, and at the
same time continuing my studies. I saw no inconsistency in this
plan.
"These thoughts were so satisfactory to my mind, that I promised
Tiberge to dispatch a letter by that day's post to my father: in
fact, on leaving him, I went into a scrivener's, and wrote in
such a submissive and dutiful tone, that, on reading over my own
letter, I anticipated the triumph I was going to achieve over my
father's heart.
"Although I had money enough to pay for a hackney-coach after my
interview with Tiberge, I felt a pleasure in walking
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