| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Case of the Golden Bullet by Grace Isabel Colbron and Augusta Groner: tell you all you want to know to-morrow."
"To-morrow, then."
"May I now continue to unfold my theories?" Bauer nodded and
Muller continued: "The criminal wanted Fellner's blood, no matter
how."
"Even if it meant murder," said Bauer.
Muller nodded calmly. "It would have been nobler, perhaps, to
have warned his victim of his approach, but it might have all come
to nothing then. The other could have called for help, could have
barricaded himself in his room, one crime might have been prevented,
and another, more shameful one, would have gone unavenged."
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Stories From the Old Attic by Robert Harris: child, it was likely to be better than whatever would be offered by
such a ruffian. "And besides," the woodcutter's wife said, "I
already love the child too much to give him up."
As the days passed, the old couple grew thoroughly attached to the
baby. They both found themselves unexpectedly humming little tunes
or smiling for no apparent reason, and they both found their chores
suddenly lighter and easier. They worked faster, eager to finish
and once again spend some time playing with the child.
However, it wasn't many weeks before the old woodcutter and his wife
were forced to admit that they were simply too old and too poor to
raise the child as it should be, and that they ought in all fairness
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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 Goodness of St. Rocque and Other Stories by Alice Dunbar: November came; the opera reopened. M'sieu Fortier was not
re-engaged.
"Minesse," he said with a catch in his voice that strongly
resembled a sob, "Minesse, we mus' go hongry sometime. Ah, mon
pauvre violon! Ah, mon Dieu, dey put us h'out, an' dey will not
have us. Nev' min', we will sing anyhow." And drawing his bow
across the strings, he sang in his thin, quavering voice, "Salut
demeure, chaste et pure."
It is strange what a peculiar power of fascination former haunts
have for the human mind. The criminal, after he has fled from
justice, steals back and skulks about the scene of his crime; the
The Goodness of St. Rocque and Other Stories |
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 Timaeus by Plato: and self-contained and truly blessed. The soul was first made by him--the
elder to rule the younger; not in the order in which our wayward fancy has
led us to describe them, but the soul first and afterwards the body. God
took of the unchangeable and indivisible and also of the divisible and
corporeal, and out of the two he made a third nature, essence, which was in
a mean between them, and partook of the same and the other, the intractable
nature of the other being compressed into the same. Having made a compound
of all the three, he proceeded to divide the entire mass into portions
related to one another in the ratios of 1, 2, 3, 4, 9, 8, 27, and proceeded
to fill up the double and triple intervals thus--
- over 1, 4/3, 3/2, - over 2, 8/3, 3, - over 4, 16/3, 6, - over 8:
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