| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs: And he realized all this without malice or hatred. To kill
was the law of the wild world he knew. Few were his primitive
pleasures, but the greatest of these was to hunt and kill,
and so he accorded to others the right to cherish the same
desires as he, even though he himself might be the object of
their hunt.
His strange life had left him neither morose nor bloodthirsty.
That he joyed in killing, and that he killed with a joyous
laugh upon his handsome lips betokened no innate cruelty.
He killed for food most often, but, being a man, he sometimes
killed for pleasure, a thing which no other animal does;
Tarzan of the Apes |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Chita: A Memory of Last Island by Lafcadio Hearn: house quivered and creaked; the wind brayed and screamed and
pushed and scuffled at the door; and the water, which had been
whipping in through every crevice, all at once rose over the
threshold and flooded the dwelling. Carmen dipped her finger in
the water and tasted it. It was salt!
And none of Feliu's boats had yet come in;--doubtless they had
been driven into some far-away bayous by the storm. The only
boat at the settlement, the Carmencita, had been almost wrecked
by running upon a snag three days before;--there was at least a
fortnight's work for the ship-carpenter of Dead Cypress Point.
And Feliu was sleeping as if nothing unusual had happened--the
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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 Little Britain by Washington Irving: Britain been grievously disturbed, and its golden simplicity of
manners threatened with total subversion by the aspiring family
of a retired butcher.
The family of the Lambs had long been among the most
thriving and popular in the neighborhood; the Miss Lambs
were the belles of Little Britain, and everybody was pleased
when Old Lamb had made money enough to shut up shop, and
put his name on a brass plate on his door. In an evil hour,
however, one of the Miss Lambs had the honor of being a lady
in attendance on the Lady Mayoress, at her grand annual ball,
on which occasion she wore three towering ostrich feathers on
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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 Black Dwarf by Walter Scott: about thae newfangled notions o' peace and quietness--he's a' for
the auld-warld doings o' lifting and laying on, and he has a
wheen stout lads at his back too, and keeps them weel up in
heart, and as fu' o' mischief as young colts. Where he gets the
gear to do't nane can say; he lives high, and far abune his rents
here; however, he pays his way--Sae, if there's ony out-break in
the country, he's likely to break out wi' the first--and weel
does he mind the auld quarrels between ye, I'm surmizing he'll be
for a touch at the auld tower at Earnscliff."
"Well, Hobbie," answered the young gentleman, "if he should be so
ill advised, I shall try to make the old tower good against him,
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