| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Where There's A Will by Mary Roberts Rinehart: we'll not bother about that now. We'd better start back."
It was still snowing, although not so hard. The air had done me
some good, but the lump in my throat seemed to have gone to my
chest. The doctor helped me along, for the snow was drifting,
and when he saw I was past the crying stage he went back to
what we were both thinking about.
"Old Pierce is right," he said. "Remember, Miss Minnie, I've
nothing against you or your mineral spring; in fact, I'm strong
for you both. But while I'm out of the ring now for good--I
don't mind saying to you what I said to Pierce, that the only
thing that gets into training here, as far as I can see, is a
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare: Yet I should kill thee with much cherishing:
Good night, good night
Rom. Parting is such sweete sorrow,
That I shall say goodnight, till it be morrow
Iul. Sleepe dwell vpon thine eyes, peace in thy brest
Rom. Would I were sleepe and peace so sweet to rest,
The gray ey'd morne smiles on the frowning night,
Checkring the Easterne Clouds with streakes of light,
And darkenesse fleckel'd like a drunkard reeles,
From forth dayes pathway, made by Titans wheeles.
Hence will I to my ghostly Friers close Cell,
Romeo and Juliet |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Tales of Unrest by Joseph Conrad: went upstairs slowly, struggling with a distasteful suspicion of
having been confronted by something more subtle than herself--more
profound than the misunderstood and tragic contest of her feelings.
He shut the door of the drawing-room and moved at hazard, alone
amongst the heavy shadows and in the fiery twilight as of an elegant
place of perdition. She hadn't the gift--no one had. . . . He stepped
on a book that had fallen off one of the crowded little tables. He
picked up the slender volume, and holding it, approached the
crimson-shaded lamp. The fiery tint deepened on the cover, and
contorted gold letters sprawling all over it in an intricate maze,
came out, gleaming redly. "Thorns and Arabesques." He read it twice,
Tales of Unrest |
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 New Poems by Robert Louis Stevenson: And with dews for ever wet;
So from this garish life the spirit peers;
And lo! as a sleeping city death outspread,
Where breathe the sleepers evenly; and lo!
After the loud wars, triumphs, trumpets, tears
And clamour of man's passion, Death appears,
And we must rise and go.
Soon are eyes tired with sunshine; soon the ears
Weary of utterance, seeing all is said;
Soon, racked by hopes and fears,
The all-pondering, all-contriving head,
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