| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Daughter of Eve by Honore de Balzac: occasion for an explanation arrived in due time.
On a fine April morning the countess accepted Nathan's arm for a walk
through the sequestered path of the Bois de Boulogne. She intended to
make him one of those pretty little quarrels apropos of nothing, which
women are so fond of exciting. Instead of greeting him as usual, with
a smile upon her lips, her forehead illumined with pleasure, her eyes
bright with some gay or delicate thought, she assumed a grave and
serious aspect.
"What is the matter?" said Nathan.
"Why do you pretend to such ignorance?" she replied. "You ought to
know that a woman is not a child."
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Emma McChesney & Co. by Edna Ferber: in the midst of her busy day and listen to the chant of the city
as it came up to her, subdued, softened, strangely beautified.
The sound saddened even while it filled her with a certain
exaltation. We have no one word for that sensation. The German
(there's a language!) has it--Weltschmerz.
As distance softened the harsh sounds to her ears, so time and
experience had given her a perspective on life itself. She saw
it, not as a series of incidents, pleasant and unpleasant, but as
a great universal scheme too mighty to comprehend--a scheme that
always worked itself out in some miraculous way.
She had had a singularly full life, had Emma McChesney Buck. A
Emma McChesney & Co. |
