The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde: I hope. Remember, Patti is singing."
As he closed the door behind him, Dorian Gray touched the bell,
and in a few minutes Victor appeared with the lamps and drew
the blinds down. He waited impatiently for him to go.
The man seemed to take an interminable time over everything.
As soon as he had left, he rushed to the screen and drew it back.
No; there was no further change in the picture. It had received
the news of Sibyl Vane's death before he had known of it himself.
It was conscious of the events of life as they occurred.
The vicious cruelty that marred the fine lines of the mouth had,
no doubt, appeared at the very moment that the girl had drunk
The Picture of Dorian Gray |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Ball at Sceaux by Honore de Balzac: laughed for no particular reason, less to amuse her brother than to
attract the attention of the imperturbable stranger. None of her
little arts succeeded. Mademoiselle de Fontaine then followed the
direction in which his eyes were fixed, and discovered the cause of
his indifference.
In the midst of the quadrille, close in front of them, a pale girl was
dancing; her face was like one of the divinities which Girodet has
introduced into his immense composition of French Warriors received by
Ossian. Emilie fancied that she recognized her as a distinguished
milady who for some months had been living on a neighboring estate.
Her partner was a lad of about fifteen, with red hands, and dressed in
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