| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Red Inn by Honore de Balzac: The murmur of voices swelled, and groups gathered.
"Can Monsieur Taillefer be--" I began.
"--dead?" said my sarcastic neighbor. "You would wear the gayest
mourning, I fancy!"
"But what has happened to him?"
"The poor dear man," said the mistress of the house, "is subject to
attacks of a disease the name of which I never can remember, though
Monsieur Brousson has often told it to me; and he has just been seized
with one."
"What is the nature of the disease?" asked an examining-judge.
"Oh, it is something terrible, monsieur," she replied. "The doctors
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Inaugural Address by John F. Kennedy: by science engulf all humanity in planned or accidental self-destruction.
We dare not tempt them with weakness. For only when our arms are sufficient
beyond doubt can we be certain beyond doubt that they will never be employed.
But neither can two great and powerful groups of nations take comfort from
our present course. . .both sides overburdened by the cost of modern weapons,
both rightly alarmed by the steady spread of the deadly atom, yet both racing
to alter that uncertain balance of terror that stays the hand of Mankind's
final war.
So let us begin anew. . .remembering on both sides that civility
is not a sign of weakness, and sincerity is always subject to proof.
Let us never negotiate out of fear, but let us never fear to negotiate.
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