| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Camille by Alexandre Dumas: silence, in order to transact their business in peace. Never was
there a noisier or a more varied gathering.
I slipped quietly into the midst of this tumult, sad to think of
when one remembered that the poor creature whose goods were being
sold to pay her debts had died in the next room. Having come
rather to examine than to buy, I watched the faces of the
auctioneers, noticing how they beamed with delight whenever
anything reached a price beyond their expectations. Honest
creatures, who had speculated upon this woman's prostitution, who
had gained their hundred per cent out of her, who had plagued
with their writs the last moments of her life, and who came now
 Camille |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare: Rom. Not I beleeue me, you haue dancing shooes
With nimble soles, I haue a soale of Lead
So stakes me to the ground, I cannot moue
Mer. You are a Louer, borrow Cupids wings,
And soare with them aboue a common bound
Rom. I am too sore enpearced with his shaft,
To soare with his light feathers, and to bound:
I cannot bound a pitch aboue dull woe,
Vnder loues heauy burthen doe I sinke
Hora. And to sinke in it should you burthen loue,
Too great oppression for a tender thing
 Romeo and Juliet |