| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Crito by Plato: most constant resident in the city, which, as you never leave, you may be
supposed to love (compare Phaedr.). For you never went out of the city
either to see the games, except once when you went to the Isthmus, or to
any other place unless when you were on military service; nor did you
travel as other men do. Nor had you any curiosity to know other states or
their laws: your affections did not go beyond us and our state; we were
your especial favourites, and you acquiesced in our government of you; and
here in this city you begat your children, which is a proof of your
satisfaction. Moreover, you might in the course of the trial, if you had
liked, have fixed the penalty at banishment; the state which refuses to let
you go now would have let you go then. But you pretended that you
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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 Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery: clinging to that slippery old pile with no way of getting up or
down. It was a very unromantic position, but I didn't think
about that at the time. You don't think much about romance when
you have just escaped from a watery grave. I said a grateful
prayer at once and then I gave all my attention to holding on
tight, for I knew I should probably have to depend on human aid
to get back to dry land."
The flat drifted under the bridge and then promptly sank in
midstream. Ruby, Jane, and Diana, already awaiting it on the
lower headland, saw it disappear before their very eyes and had
not a doubt but that Anne had gone down with it. For a moment
 Anne of Green Gables |