| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne: her apron, in expectation every moment, that my uncle Toby would go on; but
having no talents for amplification, and Love moreover of all others being
a subject of which he was the least a master--When he had told Mrs. Wadman
once that he loved her, he let it alone, and left the matter to work after
its own way.
My father was always in raptures with this system of my uncle Toby's, as he
falsely called it, and would often say, that could his brother Toby to his
processe have added but a pipe of tobacco--he had wherewithal to have found
his way, if there was faith in a Spanish proverb, towards the hearts of
half the women upon the globe.
My uncle Toby never understood what my father meant; nor will I presume to
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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 Complete Angler by Izaak Walton: being a few of them also thrown in as you are angling, will be the
better.
And your paste must be thus made: take the flesh of a rabbit, or cat, cut
small; and bean-flour; and if that may not be easily got, get other flour;
and then, mix these together, and put to them either sugar, or honey,
which I think better: and then beat these together in a mortar, or
sometimes work them in your hands, your hands being very clean; and
then make it into a ball, or two, or three, as you like best, for your use:
but you must work or pound it so long in the mortar, as to make it so
tough as to hang upon your hook without washing from it, yet not too
hard: or, that you may the better keep it on your hook, you may knead
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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 Russia in 1919 by Arthur Ransome: his peaked grey fur hat on his head, rounder than ever in
fur-collared, thick coat, his eye-glasses slipping from his
nose as he got up, his grey muffler hanging from his neck,
he hurried to the tribune. Taking off his things and leaving
them on a chair below, he stepped up into the tribune with
his hair all rumpled, a look of extreme seriousness on his
face, and spoke with a voice whose capacity and strength
astonished me who had not heard him speak in public
before. He spoke very well, with more sequence than
Bucharin, and much vitality, and gave his summary of the
position abroad. He said (and Lenin expressed the same
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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 Daisy Miller by Henry James: observed in the hotel an American family--a mamma, a daughter,
and a little boy.
"And a courier?" said Mrs. Costello. "Oh yes, I have observed them.
Seen them--heard them--and kept out of their way." Mrs. Costello was
a widow with a fortune; a person of much distinction, who frequently
intimated that, if she were not so dreadfully liable to sick headaches,
she would probably have left a deeper impress upon her time. She had a long,
pale face, a high nose, and a great deal of very striking white hair,
which she wore in large puffs and rouleaux over the top of her head.
She had two sons married in New York and another who was now in Europe.
This young man was amusing himself at Hamburg, and, though he was
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