| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Silas Marner by George Eliot: long strip o' something."
"Well, mayhap that'll do, as it's a little gell, for they're easier
persuaded to sit i' one place nor the lads. I know what the lads
are; for I've had four--four I've had, God knows--and if you was
to take and tie 'em up, they'd make a fighting and a crying as if
you was ringing the pigs. But I'll bring you my little chair, and
some bits o' red rag and things for her to play wi'; an' she'll sit
and chatter to 'em as if they was alive. Eh, if it wasn't a sin to
the lads to wish 'em made different, bless 'em, I should ha' been
glad for one of 'em to be a little gell; and to think as I could ha'
taught her to scour, and mend, and the knitting, and everything.
Silas Marner |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Island Nights' Entertainments by Robert Louis Stevenson: time lighted, when Case came back with Uma and the negro. She was
dressed and scented; her kilt was of fine tapa, looking richer in
the folds than any silk; her bust, which was of the colour of dark
honey, she wore bare only for some half a dozen necklaces of seeds
and flowers; and behind her ears and in her hair she had the
scarlet flowers of the hibiscus. She showed the best bearing for a
bride conceivable, serious and still; and I thought shame to stand
up with her in that mean house and before that grinning negro. I
thought shame, I say; for the mountebank was dressed with a big
paper collar, the book he made believe to read from was an odd
volume of a novel, and the words of his service not fit to be set
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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 A Distinguished Provincial at Paris by Honore de Balzac: Lucien's young student, the incarnation of this picture, usually wore
footed trousers, shoes with thick soles to them, an overcoat of coarse
cloth, a black cravat, a waistcoat of some gray-and-white material
buttoned to the chin, and a cheap hat. Contempt for superfluity in
dress was visible in his whole person. Lucien also discovered that the
mysterious stranger with that unmistakable stamp which genius sets
upon the forehead of its slaves was one of Flicoteaux's most regular
customers; he ate to live, careless of the fare which appeared to be
familiar to him, and drank water. Wherever Lucien saw him, at the
library or at Flicoteaux's, there was a dignity in his manner,
springing doubtless from the consciousness of a purpose that filled
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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 Maria, or the Wrongs of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft: eye. During this period, my father had married another
fellow-servant, who loved him less, and knew better how to manage
his passion, than my mother. She likewise proving with child, they
agreed to keep a shop: my step-mother, if, being an illegitimate
offspring, I may venture thus to characterize her, having obtained
a sum of a rich relation, for that purpose.
"Soon after her lying-in, she prevailed on my father to take
me home, to save the expense of maintaining me, and of hiring a
girl to assist her in the care of the child. I was young, it was
true, but appeared a knowing little thing, and might be made handy.
Accordingly I was brought to her house; but not to a home--for a
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