| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Country Doctor by Honore de Balzac: but the spring came, and the sap rose. I am not used to day labor. It
is not in my nature to spend my life in fattening fowls; I cannot
stoop about turning over the soil for vegetables, nor flourish a whip
and drive a cart, nor scrub down a horse in a stable all my life, so I
must die of starvation, I suppose? I am only happy when I am up
there," he went on after a pause, pointing to the mountains. "And I
have been about among the hills for the past week; I got a sight of a
chamois, and I have the chamois there," he said, pointing to the top
of the crag; "it is at your service! Dear M. Benassis, leave me my
gun. Listen! I will leave the Commune, foi de Butifer! I will go to
the Alps; the chamois-hunters will not say a word; on the contrary,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Extracts From Adam's Diary by Mark Twain: GARDEN-OF-EDEN. Privately, I continue to call it that, but not
any longer publicly. The new creature says it is all woods and
rocks and scenery, and therefore has no resemblance to a garden.
Says it looks like a park, and does not look like anything but a
park. Consequently, without consulting me, it has been new-named--
NIAGARA FALLS PARK. This is sufficiently high-handed, it seems to
me. And already there is a sign up:
KEEP OFF
THE GRASS
My life is not as happy as it was.
Saturday
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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 Facino Cane by Honore de Balzac: and rubies--then a sort of madness began to work in me. I had the gold
fever.
"We landed at Smyrna and took ship at once for France. As we went on
board the French vessel, Heaven favored me by ridding me of my
accomplice. I did not think at the time of all the possible
consequences of this mishap, and rejoiced not a little. We were so
completely unnerved by all that had happened, that we were stupid, we
said not a word to each other, we waited till it should be safe to
enjoy ourselves at our ease. It was not wonderful that the rogue's
head was dizzy. You shall see how heavily God has punished me.
"I never knew a quiet moment until I had sold two-thirds of my
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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 Faraday as a Discoverer by John Tyndall: the Bakerian Lecture for the year. He placed a bar of iron in a coil
of wire, and lifting the bar into the direction of the dipping needle,
he excited by this action a current in the coil. On reversing the
bar, a current in the opposite direction rushed through the wire.
The same effect was produced when, on holding the helix in the line
of dip, a bar of iron was thrust into it. Here, however, the earth
acted on the coil through the intermediation of the bar of iron.
He abandoned the bar and simply set a copper plate spinning in a
horizontal plane; he knew that the earth's lines of magnetic force
then crossed the plate at an angle of about 70degrees. When the plate
spun round, the lines of force were intersected and induced currents
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