| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Purse by Honore de Balzac: Adelaide's protector froze his heart and dispelled his purpose.
For the hundredth time he wondered what interest could bring this
old prodigal, with his eighty thousand francs a year, to this
fourth story, where he lost about forty francs every evening; and
he thought he could guess what it was.
The next and following days Hippolyte threw himself into his
work, and to try to conquer his passion by the swift rush of
ideas and the ardor of composition. He half succeeded. Study
consoled him, though it could not smother the memories of so many
tender hours spent with Adelaide.
One evening, as he left his studio, he saw the door of 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 Virginibus Puerisque by Robert Louis Stevenson: again and leave him all his SAVOIR. I scarcely think he would
put his money in the Savings Bank after all; I doubt if he
would be such an admirable son as we are led to expect; and as
for his conduct in love, I believe firmly he would out-Herod
Herod, and put the whole of his new compeers to the blush.
Prudence is a wooden juggernaut, before whom Benjamin Franklin
walks with the portly air of a high priest, and after whom
dances many a successful merchant in the character of Atys.
But it is not a deity to cultivate in youth. If a man lives
to any considerable age, it cannot be denied that he laments
his imprudences, but I notice he often laments his youth a
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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 The Two Brothers by Honore de Balzac: able, soon after, to exchange it on equal terms with the incumbent of
another office, situated in the rue de Seine, in a house where Joseph
was able to have his atelier. The widow now hired an agent herself,
and was no longer an expense to her son. And yet, as late as 1828,
though she was the directress of an excellent office which she owed
entirely to Joseph's fame, Madame Bridau still had no belief in that
fame, which was hotly contested, as all true glory ever will be. The
great painter, struggling with his genius, had enormous wants; he did
not earn enough to pay for the luxuries which his relations to
society, and his distinguished position in the young School of Art
demanded. Though powerfully sustained by his friends of the Cenacle
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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 Altar of the Dead by Henry James: weakness, his life's weariness overtook him. It seemed to him he
had come for the great surrender. At first he asked himself how he
should get away; then, with the failing belief in the power, the
very desire to move gradually left him. He had come, as he always
came, to lose himself; the fields of light were still there to
stray in; only this time, in straying, he would never come back.
He had given himself to his Dead, and it was good: this time his
Dead would keep him. He couldn't rise from his knees; he believed
he should never rise again; all he could do was to lift his face
and fix his eyes on his lights. They looked unusually, strangely
splendid, but the one that always drew him most had an
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