| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Dreams & Dust by Don Marquis: Shall build, with mingled truth and lies, new icons
from the world-old clods.
Through all the tangled creeds and dreams and
shifting shibboleths men hold
The false-and-true, inwoven, gleams: a matted
mass of dross and gold.
Prove, then, thy gods in thine own soul; all others'
gods, for thee, are vain;
Nor swerved be, struggling for the goal, by bribe
of joy nor threat of pain.
As skulls grow broader, so do faiths; as old tongues
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Prince of Bohemia by Honore de Balzac: duchess, you shall not know me again! Ah! how good you have been
to your Claudine! How many and many a time I have thanked you for
telling me those things! What interest lay in those few words! You
have taken thought for that thing belonging to you called
Claudine? /This/ imbecile would never have opened my eyes; he
thinks that everything I do is right; and besides, he is much too
humdrum, too matter-of-fact to have any feeling for the beautiful.
" 'Tuesday is very slow of coming for my impatient mind! On
Tuesday I shall be with you for several hours. Ah! when it comes I
will try to think that the hours are months, that it will be so
always. I am living in hope of that morning now, as I shall live
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