| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Polity of Athenians and Lacedaemonians by Xenophon: him who openly neglected to make himself as good as possible? For
this, it seems, was his principle: in the one case, where a man is
robbed, or defrauded, or kidnapped, and made a slave of, the injury of
the misdeed, whatever it be, is personal to the individual so
maltreated; but in the other case whole communities suffer foul
treason at the hands of the base man and the coward. So that it was
only reasonable, in my opinion, that he should visit the heaviest
penalty upon these latter.
Moreover, he laid upon them, like some irresistible necessity, the
obligation to cultivate the whole virtue of a citizen. Provided they
duly performed the injunctions of the law, the city belonged to them,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry: End of this Project Gutenberg Etext of THE GIFT OF THE MAGI.
 The Gift of the Magi |