| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Moon-Face and Other Stories by Jack London: "Have you ever heard of the secret pasture?" she asked, her eyes still fixed
on the remote green.
A snort of fear brought her eyes back to the man beside her. Dolly, upreared,
with distended nostrils and wild eyes, was pawing the air madly with her fore
legs. Chris threw himself forward against her neck to keep her from falling
backward, and at the same time touched her with the spurs to compel her to
drop her fore feet to the ground in order to obey the go-ahead impulse of the
spurs.
"Why, Dolly, this is most remarkable," Lute began reprovingly.
But, to her surprise, the mare threw her head down, arched her back as she
went up in the air, and, returning, struck the ground stiff-legged and
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Agesilaus by Xenophon: though a veteran when he died. Never was there a leader who inspired
stouter courage in the hearts of fellow-combatants than this man with
one foot planted in the grave. Never was a young man snatched from a
circle of loving friends with tenderer regret than this old graybeard.
[11] Reading, {megalon kai kalon ephiemenos, eos kai to soma, k.t.l.}
See Breitenbach.
The benefactor of his fatherland, absolutely to the very end; with
bounteous hand, even in the arms of death, dealing out largesse[12] to
the city which he loved. And so they bore him home to his eternal
resting-place;[13] this hero, who, having raised to himself many a
monument of his valour over the broad earth, came back to find in the
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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 Hidden Masterpiece by Honore de Balzac: color of Titian has forced out the skeleton outline of Albrecht
Durier, as molten bronze might burst and overflow a slender mould.
Here and there the outline has resisted the flood, and holds back the
magnificent torrent of Venetian color. Your figure is neither
perfectly well painted nor perfectly well drawn; it bears throughout
the signs of this unfortunate indecision. If you did not feel that the
fire of your genius was hot enough to weld into one the rival methods,
you ought to have chosen honestly the one or the other, and thus
attained the unity which conveys one aspect, at least, of life. As it
is, you are true only on your middle plane. Your outlines are false;
they do not round upon themselves; they suggest nothing behind them.
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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 Poems by Bronte Sisters: Beneath the strain of care.
Life will be gone ere I have lived;
Where now is Life's first prime?
I've worked and studied, longed and grieved,
Through all that rosy time.
To toil, to think, to long, to grieve,--
Is such my future fate?
The morn was dreary, must the eve
Be also desolate?
Well, such a life at least makes Death
A welcome, wished-for friend;
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