| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A House of Pomegranates by Oscar Wilde: said, 'and after that we have danced thou shalt tell me the thing
which I desire to know.'
She shook her head. 'When the moon is full, when the moon is
full,' she muttered. Then she peered all round, and listened. A
blue bird rose screaming from its nest and circled over the dunes,
and three spotted birds rustled through the coarse grey grass and
whistled to each other. There was no other sound save the sound of
a wave fretting the smooth pebbles below. So she reached out her
hand, and drew him near to her and put her dry lips close to his
ear.
'To-night thou must come to the top of the mountain,' she
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Beauty and The Beast by Bayard Taylor: listens to your words, prays that your hard heart may be softened!
Remember her last farewell to you on earth, her hope of meeting
you--"
A cry of savage wrath checked her. Stretching one huge, bony hand,
as if to close her lips, trembling with rage and pain, livid and
convulsed in every feature of his face, Prince Alexis reversed the
whip in his right hand, and weighed its thick, heavy butt for one
crashing, fatal blow. Life and death were evenly balanced. For an
instant the Princess became deadly pale, and a sickening fear shot
through her heart. She could not understand the effect of her
words: her mind was paralyzed, and what followed came without her
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Village Rector by Honore de Balzac: of the Correze, is like (agriculture apart) the plateau of La Beauce,
which separates the basin of the Loire from that of the Seine, also
like those of Touraine and Berry, and many other of the great upland
plains which are cut like facets on the surface of France and are
numerous enough to claim the attention of the wisest administrators.
It is amazing that while complaint is made of the influx of population
to the social centres, the government does not employ the natural
remedy of redeeming a region where, as statistics show, there are many
million acres of waste land, certain parts of which, especially in
Berry, have a soil from seven to eight feet deep.
Many of these plains which might be covered by villages and made
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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 The Pocket Diary Found in the Snow by Grace Isabel Colbron and Augusta Groner: agitation, the sentence, "Please take this to the nearest police
station."
The words were like a cry for help, frozen on to the ugly paper.
Amster shivered; he had a feeling that this was a matter of life
and death.
The wagon tracks in the lonely street, the broken pieces of glass
and the drops of blood, showing that some occupant of the vehicle
had broken the window, in the hope of escape, perhaps, or to throw
out the package which should bring assistance - all these facts
grouped themselves together in the brain of the intelligent
working-man to form some terrible tragedy where his assistance, if
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