| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Paz by Honore de Balzac: time of our revolution. Joining the Polish cause, he fought like a
Pole, like a patriot, like a man who has nothing,--three good reasons
for fighting well. In his last affair, thinking he was followed by his
men, he dashed upon a Russian battery and was taken prisoner. I was
there. His brave act roused me. 'Let us go and get him!' I said to my
troop, and we charged the battery like a lot of foragers. I got Paz--I
was the seventh man; we started twenty and came back eight, counting
Paz. After Warsaw was sold we were forced to escape those Russians. By
a curious chance, Paz and I happened to come together again, at the
same hour and the same place, on the other side of the Vistula. I saw
the poor captain arrested by some Prussians, who made themselves the
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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 Gentle Grafter by O. Henry: in return for all the benefits accruing from a $125.00 ring. His
profits are $122.00. Which of us is the biggest fakir?'
"'And when you sell a poor woman a pinch of sand for fifty cents to
keep her lamp from exploding,' says Bassett, 'what do you figure her
gross earnings to be, with sand at forty cents a ton?'
"'Listen,' says I. 'I instruct her to keep her lamp clean and well
filled. If she does that it can't burst. And with the sand in it she
knows it can't, and she don't worry. It's a kind of Industrial
Christian Science. She pays fifty cents, and gets both Rockefeller and
Mrs. Eddy on the job. It ain't everybody that can let the gold-dust
twins do their work.'
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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 Oedipus Trilogy by Sophocles: Quarrel of ancient date or in days still near know I none
Twixt the Labdacidan house and our ruler, Polybus' son.
Proof is there none: how then can I challenge our King's good name,
How in a blood-feud join for an untracked deed of shame?
(Ant. 2)
All wise are Zeus and Apollo, and nothing is hid from their ken;
They are gods; and in wits a man may surpass his fellow men;
But that a mortal seer knows more than I know--where
Hath this been proven? Or how without sign assured, can I blame
Him who saved our State when the winged songstress came,
Tested and tried in the light of us all, like gold assayed?
Oedipus Trilogy |
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 Nana, Miller's Daughter, Captain Burle, Death of Olivier Becaille by Emile Zola: buffer Bordenave, with his leg duly stretched on its chair, was
letting his neighbors, Lucy and Rose, wait on him as though he were
a sultan. They were entirely taken up with him, and they helped him
and pampered him and watched over his glass and his plate, and yet
that did not prevent his complaining.
"Who's going to cut up my meat for me? I can't; the table's a
league away."
Every few seconds Simonne rose and took up a position behind his
back in order to cut his meat and his bread. All the women took a
great interest in the things he ate. The waiters were recalled, and
he was stuffed to suffocation. Simonne having wiped his mouth for
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