| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Poor and Proud by Oliver Optic: her I could not take it. She laughed at me, and I said I was poor
and proud. She would make me take it, and said so much, that, at
last, I told her if she would lend it to me, I would take it."
"It was the same as a gift," said Mrs. Redburn, blushing with
shame at the thought of accepting alms.
"No, it wasn't; she may think it was, but I mean to pay her, and
I shall pay her; I know I shall."
"If you can," sighed the proud mother.
"I shall be able to pay her soon, for I mean to sell lots of
candy."
"You may be disappointed."
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Historical Lecturers and Essays by Charles Kingsley: magnificent self-sacrifice, however hideously misplaced, which shows
what a womanly heart was there; a heart which, joined to that
queenly brain, might have made her a blessing and a glory to
Scotland, had not the whole character been warped and ruinate from
childhood, by an education so abominable, that anyone who knows what
words she must have heard, what scenes she must have beheld in
France, from her youth up, will wonder that she sinned so little:
not that she sinned so much. One may feel, in a word, that there is
every excuse for those who have asserted Mary's innocence, because
their own high-mindedness shrank from believing her guilty: but
yet Buchanan, in his own place and time, may have felt as deeply
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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 Lin McLean by Owen Wister: all Hot Scotches between; but the next occurred within a few yards, and
it was across the street. This one being attained and appreciated, he
found that he must cross back again or skip number four. At this rate he
would not be dining in time to see much of the theatre, and he stopped to
consider. It was a German place he had just quitted, and a huge light
poured out on him from its window, which the proprietor's father-land
sentiment had made into a show. Lights shone among a well-set pine
forest, where beery, jovial gnomes sat on roots and reached upward to
Santa Claus; he, grinning, fat, and Teutonic, held in his right hand
forever a foaming glass, and forever in his left a string of sausages
that dangled down among the gnomes. With his American back to this, the
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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 Chance by Joseph Conrad: their dealings with each other. I believe that any woman would
rather trust a man. The difficulty in such a delicate case was how
to get on terms.
So we held our peace in the odious uproar of that wide roadway
thronged with heavy carts. Great vans carrying enormous piled-up
loads advanced swaying like mountains. It was as if the whole world
existed only for selling and buying and those who had nothing to do
with the movement of merchandise were of no account.
"You must be tired," I said. One had to say something if only to
assert oneself against that wearisome, passionless and crushing
uproar. She raised her eyes for a moment. No, she was not. Not
Chance |
