| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Pierre Grassou by Honore de Balzac: loyalty; though they had no esteem for his palette, they loved the man
who held it.
"What a misfortune it is that Fougeres has the vice of painting!" said
his comrades.
But for all this, Grassou gave excellent counsel, like those
feuilletonists incapable of writing a book who know very well where a
book is wanting. There was this difference, however, between literary
critics and Fougeres; he was eminently sensitive to beauties; he felt
them, he acknowledged them, and his advice was instinct with a spirit
of justice that made the justness of his remarks acceptable. After the
revolution of July, Fougeres sent about ten pictures a year to the
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from I Have A Dream by Martin Luther King, Jr.: the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be
self-evident: that all men are created equal."
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons
of former slaves and the sons of former slaveowners will be able
to sit down together at a table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a
desert state, sweltering with the heat of injustice and
oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and
justice.
I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin
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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 Crisis in Russia by Arthur Ransome: like miracles. It can be and is controlled like an army in
battle. It can mobilize its members, 10 per cent. of them,
50 per cent., the local Committees choosing them, and send
them to the front when the front is in danger, or to the
railways and repair shops when it is decided that the weakest
point is that of transport. If its only task were to fight those
organizations of loosely knit and only momentarily united
interests which are opposed to it, those jerry-built alliances
of Reactionaries with Liberals, United-Indivisible-Russians
with Ukrainians, Agrarians with Sugar-Refiners,
Monarchists with Republicans, that task would long ago
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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 Philosophy 4 by Owen Wister: "By gum!" said he, laying his fork down. "Multiplicity of the ego. Look
here. I fall out of a buggy and ask--"
"By gum!" said Bertie, now also visited by inspiration.
"Don't you see?" said Billy.
"I see a whole lot more," said Bertie, with excitement. "I had to tell
you about your singing." And the two burst into a flare of talk. To
hear such words as cognition, attention, retention, entity, and
identity, freely mingled with such other words as silver-fizz and false
hair, brought John, the egg-and-coffee man, as near surprise as his
impregnable nature permitted. Thus they finished their large breakfast,
and hastened to their notes for a last good bout at memorizing
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