| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Ferragus by Honore de Balzac: world has no break of continuity from one boundary to another. Before
long, persons arriving at the mayor's office released him from all
embarrassment. They were able to convert the /proces-verbal/ into a
mere certificate of death, by recognizing the body as that of the
Demoiselle Ida Gruget, corset-maker, living rue de la Corderie-du-
Temple, number 14. The judiciary police of Paris arrived, and the
mother, bearing her daughter's last letter. Amid the mother's moans, a
doctor certified to death by asphyxia, through the injection of black
blood into the pulmonary system,--which settled the matter. The
inquest over, and the certificates signed, by six o'clock the same
evening authority was given to bury the grisette. The rector of the
Ferragus |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe: can compare to no earthly sensation more properly than to the
after-dream of the reveller upon opium--the bitter lapse into
everyday life--the hideous dropping off of the veil. There was
an iciness, a sinking, a sickening of the heart--an unredeemed
dreariness of thought which no goading of the imagination could
torture into aught of the sublime. What was it--I paused to
think--what was it that so unnerved me in the contemplation of
the House of Usher? It was a mystery all insoluble; nor could I
grapple with the shadowy fancies that crowded upon me as I
pondered. I was forced to fall back upon the unsatisfactory
conclusion, that while, beyond doubt, there are combinations
The Fall of the House of Usher |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain: way that's a little more complicated than THAT, Huck
Finn."
"Well, then," I says, "how 'll it do to saw him out,
the way I done before I was murdered that time?"
"That's more LIKE," he says. "It's real mysterious,
and troublesome, and good," he says; "but I bet we
can find a way that's twice as long. There ain't no
hurry; le's keep on looking around."
Betwixt the hut and the fence, on the back side, was
a lean-to that joined the hut at the eaves, and was made
out of plank. It was as long as the hut, but narrow
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn |
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 Beast in the Jungle by Henry James: absence of other near ties, not disreputably occupied. The rest of
the world of course thought him queer, but she, she only, knew how,
and above all why, queer; which was precisely what enabled her to
dispose the concealing veil in the right folds. She took his
gaiety from him--since it had to pass with them for gaiety--as she
took everything else; but she certainly so far justified by her
unerring touch his finer sense of the degree to which he had ended
by convincing her. SHE at least never spoke of the secret of his
life except as "the real truth about you," and she had in fact a
wonderful way of making it seem, as such, the secret of her own
life too. That was in fine how he so constantly felt her as
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