| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Reign of King Edward the Third by William Shakespeare: When envy and destruction is so nigh?
ONE.
Content thee, man; they are far enough from hence,
And will be met, I warrant ye, to their cost,
Before they break so far into the Realm.
TWO.
Aye, so the Grasshopper doth spend the time
In mirthful jollity, till Winter come;
And then too late he would redeem his time,
When frozen cold hath nipped his careless head.
He, that no sooner will provide a Cloak,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from House of Mirth by Edith Wharton: instead of bringing him to a halt, as she had half-expected, sent
him toward her with an eagerness which found expression in his
opening words.
"Miss Bart!--You'll shake hands, won't you? I've been hoping to
meet you--I should have written to you if I'd dared." His face,
with its tossed red hair and straggling moustache, had a driven
uneasy look, as though life had become an unceasing race between
himself and the thoughts at his heels.
The look drew a word of compassionate greeting from Lily, and he
pressed on, as if encouraged by her tone: "I wanted to
apologize--to ask you to forgive me for the miserable part I
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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 Historical Lecturers and Essays by Charles Kingsley: united into one people, strong, not in mere political, but in moral
ideas; strong by the clear sense of right and wrong, by the belief
in the government and the judgments of a living God. And the tone
which Buchanan, like Knox, adopted concerning the great crimes of
their day, helped notably that national salvation. It gathered
together, organised, strengthened, the scattered and wavering
elements of public morality. It assured the hearts of all men who
loved the right and hated the wrong; and taught a whole nation to
call acts by their just names, whoever might be the doers of them.
It appealed to the common conscience of men. It proclaimed a
universal and God-given morality, a bar at which all, from the
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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 Out of Time's Abyss by Edgar Rice Burroughs: employed variously to indicate life, eggs, young, reproduction
and kindred subject; cos was a negative; but in combination
they were meaningless to the European.
"Do you mean they will kill you?" asked Bradley.
"I but wish that they would," replied the girl. "My fate is to
be worse than death--in just a few nights more, with the coming
of the new moon."
"Poor she-snake!" snapped the Wieroo. "You are to become sacred
above all other shes. He Who Speaks for Luata has chosen you
for himself. Today you go to his temple--"the Wieroo used a
phrase meaning literally High Place--"where you will receive
Out of Time's Abyss |
