| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Hated Son by Honore de Balzac: scientific work. Beauvouloir had for some time desired the situation,
because his knowledge and his fortune had won him numerous bitter
enemies. In spite of the protection of a great family to whom he had
done great services, he had recently been implicated in a criminal
case, and the intervention of the Governor of Normandy, obtained by
the duchess, had alone saved him from being brought to trial. The duke
had no reason to repent this protection given to the old bonesetter.
Beauvouloir saved the life of the Marquis de Saint-Sever in so
dangerous an illness that any other physician would have failed in
doing so. But the wounds of the duchess were too deep-seated and dated
too far back to be cured, especially as they were constantly kept open
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Selected Writings of Guy De Maupassant by Guy De Maupassant: and eight days later she died of inflammation of the lungs.
M. Lantin's despair was so great that his hair became white in
one month. He wept unceasingly; his heart was torn with grief,
and his mind was haunted by the remembrance, the smile, the
voice--by every charm of his beautiful, dead wife.
Time, the healer, did not assuage his grief. Often during office
hours, while his colleagues were discussing the topics of the
day, his eyes would suddenly fill with tears, and he would give
vent to his grief in heartrending sobs. Everything in his wife's
room remained as before her decease; and here he was wont to
seclude himself daily and think of her who had been his
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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 New Machiavelli by H. G. Wells: I felt enterprising, and indeed it is easy to be daring with people
one has never seen before and may never see again. I said I loved
beautiful scenery and all beautiful things, and the pointing note in
my voice made her laugh. She told me I had bold eyes, and so far as
I can remember I said she made them bold. "Blue they are," she
remarked, smiling archly. "I like blue eyes." Then I think we
compared ages, and she said she was the Woman of Thirty, "George
Moore's Woman of Thirty."
I had not read George Moore at the time, but I pretended to
understand.
That, I think, was our limit that evening. She went to bed, smiling
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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 Laches by Plato: extremity, and may save us and also settle your own opinion, if you will
tell us what you think about courage.
NICIAS: I have been thinking, Socrates, that you and Laches are not
defining courage in the right way; for you have forgotten an excellent
saying which I have heard from your own lips.
SOCRATES: What is it, Nicias?
NICIAS: I have often heard you say that 'Every man is good in that in
which he is wise, and bad in that in which he is unwise.'
SOCRATES: That is certainly true, Nicias.
NICIAS: And therefore if the brave man is good, he is also wise.
SOCRATES: Do you hear him, Laches?
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