| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Exiles by Honore de Balzac: Like some learned men who give themselves infinite pains to complicate
the clear and simple laws of nature, she had already invented a
chaotic romance to account for the meeting of these three persons
under her humble roof. She hunted through the chest, examined
everything, but could find nothing extraordinary. She saw nothing on
the table but a writing-case and some sheets of parchment; and as she
could not read, this discovery told her nothing. A woman's instinct
then took her into the young man's room, and from thence she descried
her two lodgers crossing the river in the ferry boat.
"They stand like two statues," said she to herself. "Ah, ha! They are
landing at the Rue du Fouarre. How nimble he is, the sweet youth! He
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Black Tulip by Alexandre Dumas: of Aristides, contented themselves with banishing him.
John de Witt, at the first intimation of the charge brought
against his brother, had resigned his office of Grand
Pensionary. He too received a noble recompense for his
devotedness to the best interests of his country, taking
with him into the retirement of private life the hatred of a
host of enemies, and the fresh scars of wounds inflicted by
assassins, only too often the sole guerdon obtained by
honest people, who are guilty of having worked for their
country, and of having forgotten their own private
interests.
The Black Tulip |
