| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Exiles by Honore de Balzac: indeed truly startling and portentous. In Doctor Sigier's day, as in
our own, man has striven to gain wings to fly into the sanctuary where
God hides from our gaze.
This digression was necessary to give a clue to the scene at which the
old man and the youth from the island under Notre-Dame had come to be
audience; it will also protect this narrative from all blame on the
score of falsehood and hyperbole, of which certain persons of hasty
judgment might perhaps suspect me.
Doctor Sigier was a tall man in the prime of life. His face, rescued
from oblivion by the archives of the University, had singular
analogies with that of Mirabeau. It was stamped with the seal of
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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 Two Poets by Honore de Balzac: to hold salt enough to cook your eggs with--sabots that your father
has plodded on with these twenty years; they have helped him to make
you what you are."
The father, without coming to grief on the way, lurched down the worn,
knotty staircase that shook under his tread. In the passage he opened
the door of the workshop, flew to the nearest press (artfully oiled
and cleaned for the occasion) and pointed out the strong oaken cheeks,
polished up by the apprentice.
"Isn't it a love of a press?"
A wedding announcement lay in the press. The old "bear" folded down
the frisket upon the tympan, and the tympan upon the form, ran in the
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