| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Chronicles of the Canongate by Walter Scott: the coach, the weaker party having gone without their dinner, and
the able-bodied and active threatened with indigestion, from
having swallowed victuals like a Lei'stershire clown bolting
bacon.
On the memorable occasion I am speaking of I lost my breakfast,
sheerly from obeying the commands of a respectable-looking old
lady, who once required me to ring the bell, and another time to
help the tea-kettle. I have some reason to think she was
literally an OLD-STAGER, who laughed in her sleeve at my
complaisance; so that I have sworn in my secret soul revenge upon
her sex, and all such errant damsels of whatever age and degree
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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 House of Pomegranates by Oscar Wilde: of the smoke. And after a time she clenched her hands in anger.
'He should have been mine,' she muttered, 'I am as fair as she is.'
And that evening, when the moon had risen, the young Fisherman
climbed up to the top of the mountain, and stood under the branches
of the hornbeam. Like a targe of polished metal the round sea lay
at his feet, and the shadows of the fishing-boats moved in the
little bay. A great owl, with yellow sulphurous eyes, called to
him by his name, but he made it no answer. A black dog ran towards
him and snarled. He struck it with a rod of willow, and it went
away whining.
At midnight the witches came flying through the air like bats.
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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 Alcibiades II by Platonic Imitator: indiscretion?
ALCIBIADES: True.
SOCRATES: And there cannot be two opposites to one thing?
ALCIBIADES: There cannot.
SOCRATES: Then madness and want of sense are the same?
ALCIBIADES: That appears to be the case.
SOCRATES: We shall be in the right, therefore, Alcibiades, if we say that
all who are senseless are mad. For example, if among persons of your own
age or older than yourself there are some who are senseless,--as there
certainly are,--they are mad. For tell me, by heaven, do you not think
that in the city the wise are few, while the foolish, whom you call mad,
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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 The Octopus by Frank Norris: undying grief. Within the year, in giving birth to the child,
Angele had died.
The little babe was taken by Angele's parents, and Angele was
buried in the Mission garden near to the aged, grey sun dial.
Vanamee stood by during the ceremony, but half conscious of what
was going forward. At the last moment he had stepped forward,
looked long into the dead face framed in its plaits of gold hair,
the hair that made three-cornered the round, white forehead;
looked again at the closed eyes, with their perplexing upward
slant toward the temples, oriental, bizarre; at the lips with
their Egyptian fulness; at the sweet, slender neck; the long,
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