| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Daughter of Eve by Honore de Balzac: "To-morrow night."
The next evening, about midnight, Nathan was walking about the foyer
of the Opera with a mask on his arm, to whom he was attending in a
sufficiently conjugal manner. Presently two masked women came up to
him.
"You poor fool! Marie is here and is watching you," said one of them,
who was Vandenesse, disguised as a woman.
"If you choose to listen to me I will tell you secrets that Nathan is
hiding from you," said the other woman, who was the countess, to
Florine.
Nathan had abruptly dropped Florine's arm to follow the count, who
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A treatise on Good Works by Dr. Martin Luther: that the very least of Christians should endure and keep silent,
if it departs a hair's breadth from its own duty, not to say when
it does the very opposite of its duty, as we now see it do every
day.
XIV. In this power also there is much abuse. First, when it
follows the flatterers, which is a common and especially harmful
plague of this power, against which no one can sufficiently guard
and protect himself. Here it is led by the nose, and oppresses
the common people, becomes a government of the like of which a
heathen says: "The spider-webs catch the small flies, but the
mill-stones roll through." So the laws, ordinances and government
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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 Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton by Edith Wharton: thought I could manage it. Then we heard that he was ill--that
there'd been a consultation. Perhaps the fates were going to do
it for me! Good Lord, if that could only be! . . ."
Granice stopped and wiped his forehead: the open window did not
seem to have cooled the room.
"Then came word that he was better; and the day after, when I
came up from my office, I found Kate laughing over the news that
he was to try a bit of melon. The house-keeper had just
telephoned her--all Wrenfield was in a flutter. The doctor
himself had picked out the melon, one of the little French ones
that are hardly bigger than a large tomato--and the patient was
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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 Baby Mine by Margaret Mayo: faces. "What can we DO," asked Zoie.
Aggie did not answer immediately. This was indeed a serious
predicament; but presently Zoie saw her friend's mouth becoming
very resolute, and she surmised that Aggie had solved the
problem. "We'll have to get ANOTHER baby, that's all," decided
Aggie. "There must be OTHER babies."
"Where?" asked Zoie.
"There, in the Children's Home," answered Aggie with great
confidence, and she returned to the 'phone.
Zoie crossed to the bed and knelt at its foot in search of her
little pink slippers.
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