| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Father Goriot by Honore de Balzac: have been made by two men coming up in list slippers. Eugene
listened; two men there certainly were, he could hear their
breathing. Yet there had been no sound of opening the street
door, no footsteps in the passage. Suddenly, too, he saw a faint
gleam of light on the second story; it came from M. Vautrin's
room.
"There are a good many mysteries here for a lodging-house!" he
said to himself.
He went part of the way downstairs and listened again. The rattle
of gold reached his ears. In another moment the light was put
out, and again he distinctly heard the breathing of two men, but
Father Goriot |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Lucile by Owen Meredith: His fortune, which fell to his orphan, perchance
Had secured her a home with his sister in France,
A lone woman, the last of the race left. Lucile
Neither felt, nor affected, the wish to conceal
The half-Eastern blood, which appear'd to bequeath
(Reveal'd now and then, though but rarely, beneath
That outward repose that concealed it in her)
A something half wild to her strange character.
The nurse with the orphan, awhile broken-hearted,
At the door of a convent in Paris had parted.
But later, once more, with her mistress she tarried,
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Collected Articles by Frederick Douglass: I was not so fortunate as to resemble any of my free acquaintances
sufficiently to answer the description of their papers.
But I had a friend--a sailor--who owned a sailor's protection,
which answered somewhat the purpose of free papers--describing his person,
and certifying to the fact that he was a free American sailor.
The instrument had at its head the American eagle, which gave
it the appearance at once of an authorized document.
This protection, when in my hands, did not describe
its bearer very accurately. Indeed, it called for a man
much darker than myself, and close examination of it would
have caused my arrest at the start.
|
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 Man in Lower Ten by Mary Roberts Rinehart: "There's only one thing to do," I said finally. "I'll go back and
try to bring the buggy up for you. You can't walk, can you?"
Hotchkiss sat back in his puddle and said he didn't think he could
stir, but for me to go back to town and leave him, that he didn't
have any family dependent on him, and that if he was going to have
pneumonia he had probably got it already. I left him there, and
started back to get the horse.
If possible, it was worse than before. There was no lightning, and
only by a miracle did I find the little gate again. I drew a long
breath of relief, followed by another, equally long, of dismay. For
I had found the hitching strap and there was nothing at the end of
The Man in Lower Ten |
