| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Life of the Spider by J. Henri Fabre: boy did not interfere with her; he welcomed the trusting visitor as
a friend and as a pleasant diversion from the long monotony. When
we lack the society of our fellow-men, we take refuge in that of
animals, without always losing by the change.
I do not, thank God, suffer from the melancholy of a cellar: my
solitude is gay with light and verdure; I attend, whenever I
please, the fields' high festival, the Thrushes' concert, the
Crickets' symphony; and yet my friendly commerce with the Spider is
marked by an even greater devotion than the young typesetter's. I
admit her to the intimacy of my study, I make room for her among my
books, I set her in the sun on my window-ledge, I visit her
The Life of the Spider |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Wyoming by William MacLeod Raine: friends, for she had not yet forgiven him for his determination
to leave with his cousin on the night that she had been forced to
insist on his remaining. He had put her in a false position, and
he had never explained to her why. Nor could she guess the
reason--for he was not a man to harvest credit for himself by
explaining his own chivalry.
Since her heart told her how glad she was he had come to her box
to see her, she greeted him with the coolest little nod in the
world.
"Good morning, Miss Messiter. May I sit beside y'u?" he asked.
"Oh, certainly!" She swept her skirts aside carelessly and made
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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 Taras Bulba and Other Tales by Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol: mind and not of blood. There have been brotherhoods in other lands,
but never any such brotherhoods as on our Russian soil. It has
happened to many of you to be in foreign lands. You look: there are
people there also, God's creatures, too; and you talk with them as
with the men of your own country. But when it comes to saying a hearty
word--you will see. No! they are sensible people, but not the same;
the same kind of people, and yet not the same! No, brothers, to love
as the Russian soul loves, is to love not with the mind or anything
else, but with all that God has given, all that is within you. Ah!"
said Taras, and waved his hand, and wiped his grey head, and twitched
his moustache, and then went on: "No, no one else can love in that
Taras Bulba and Other Tales |
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 Heart of the West by O. Henry: overlooked his bet when he was young; and now he's suing Nature for
the interest on the promissory note he took from Cupid instead of the
cash. Rebosa, are you bent on having this marriage occur?"
"Why, sure I am," says she, oscillating the pansies on her hat, "and
so is somebody else, I reckon."
"What time is it to take place?" I asks.
"At six o'clock," says she.
I made up my mind right away what to do. I'd save old Mack if I could.
To have a good, seasoned, ineligible man like that turn chicken for a
girl that hadn't quit eating slate pencils and buttoning in the back
was more than I could look on with easiness.
Heart of the West |
