| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Tattine by Ruth Ogden [Mrs. Charles W. Ide]: "That doesn't always prove suffering, either, Tattine. Soldiers are sometimes
wounded without ever knowing it until they see a little sign of blood
somewhere."
Tattine listened attentively to all this, and was in a measure comforted. It
seemed that Mamma was still able to better things, even though not able to set
everything perfectly right. "Now," Tattine said,--with a little sigh of
relief, "I think I will try and see what I can do for Bunny. Perhaps he would
first like a drink," so downstairs she went, and putting some milk in a
shallow tea-cup, she dipped Bunny's nose in it, and it seemed to her as though
he did take a little of it. Then she trudged up to the garret for a box, and,
putting a layer of cotton-batting in the bottom, laid Bunny in one corner.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Barlaam and Ioasaph by St. John of Damascus: Thus did Ioasaph spend his days, and render unto him that called
him labour worthy of his calling, having crucified the world to
himself, and himself unto the world, and, at the last, departed
in peace unto the God of peace, and passed to that Master whom he
had alway longed for. There he appeared in the immediate
presence of the Lord, and was crowned with the crown of glory
already prepared for him: there it is granted to him to behold
Christ, to be with Christ, to rejoice for ever in the fair beauty
of Christ, into whose hands he commended his spirit, when he
departed to walk in the land of the living, where is the song of
them that feast, the dwelling-place of them that rejoice.
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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 Extracts From Adam's Diary by Mark Twain: meaning an aged and mouldy joke. I turned pale at that, for I
have made many jokes to pass the weary time, and some of them could
have been of that sort, though I had honestly supposed that they
were new when I made them. She asked me if I had made one just
at the time of the catastrophe. I was obliged to admit that I had
made one to myself, though not aloud. It was this. I was thinking
about the Falls, and I said to myself, "How wonderful it is to see
that vast body of water tumble down there!" Then in an instant a
bright thought flashed into my head, and I let it fly, saying, "It
would be a deal more wonderful to see it tumble up there!"--and I
was just about to kill myself with laughing at it when all nature
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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 The Village Rector by Honore de Balzac: the voice in my own soul which cries to me: Confess!"
The two priests, the prince of the Church as well as the humble
rector, these two great lights, each in his own way, stood with their
eyes lowered and were silent. Deeply moved by the grandeur and the
resignation of the guilty woman, the judges could not pronounce her
sentence.
"My child," said the archbishop at last, raising his noble head,
macerated by the customs of his austere life, "you are going beyond
the commandments of the Church. The glory of the Church is to make her
dogma conform to the habits and manners of each age; for the Church
goes on from age to age in company with humanity. According to her
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