| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain: fallings out; no, as a rule they were simply duels be-
tween strangers -- duels between people who had never
even been introduced to each other, and between
whom existed no cause of offense whatever. Many a
time I had seen a couple of boys, strangers, meet by
chance, and say simultaneously, "I can lick you," and
go at it on the spot; but I had always imagined until
now that that sort of thing belonged to children only,
and was a sign and mark of childhood; but here were
these big boobies sticking to it and taking pride in it
clear up into full age and beyond. Yet there was some-
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Vicar of Tours by Honore de Balzac: Mademoiselle de la Blottiere's the Abbe Poirel talked about the
annoyances which the Abbe Birotteau had inflicted on Mademoiselle
Gamard, as though he were trying to cast all the blame on our good
abbe. 'The Abbe Birotteau,' he said, 'is a man to whom the Abbe
Chapeloud was absolutely necessary, and since the death of that
venerable man, he has shown'--and then came suggestions, calumnies!
you understand?"
"Troubert will be made vicar-general," said Monsieur de Bourbonne,
sententiously.
"Come!" cried Madame de Listomere, turning to Birotteau, "which do you
prefer, to be made a canon, or continue to live with Mademoiselle
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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 Selected Writings of Guy De Maupassant by Guy De Maupassant: doing, and maintained intimate relations with the Tuileries and
the Palais Royal at the same time; sometimes she went to London
for a short time, or hurried off to Italy to watch the Hungarian
exiles, only to reappear suddenly in Switzerland, or at one of
the fashionable German watering-places.
In revolutionary circles, she was looked upon as an active member
of the great League of Freedom, and diplomatists regarded her as
an influential friend of Napoleon III.
She knew everyone, but especially those men whose names were to
be met with every day in the journals, and she counted Victor
Emmanuel, Rouher, Gladstone, and Gortschakoff among her friends
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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 Fanny Herself by Edna Ferber: Now, you know that women buyers for mail order houses do not
spend their Saturday afternoons and Sundays thus, prowling
about a city's streets. Fanny Brandeis knew it too, in her
heart. She knew that the Ella Monahans of her world spent
their holidays in stayless relaxation, manicuring, mending a
bit, skimming the Sunday papers, massaging crows'-feet
somewhat futilely. She knew that women buyers do not, as a
rule, catch their breath with delight at sight of the pock-
marked old Field Columbian museum in Jackson Park, softened
and beautified by the kindly gray chiffon of the lake mist,
and tinted by the rouge of the sunset glow, so that it is a
Fanny Herself |
