| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs: We all tried to look on the bright side of things, but Mr.
Philander, and Mr. Clayton--he joined us in London just for
the adventure--both felt as skeptical as I.
Well, to make a long story short, we found the island and
the treasure--a great iron-bound oak chest, wrapped in many
layers of oiled sailcloth, and as strong and firm as when it
had been buried nearly two hundred years ago.
It was SIMPLY FILLED with gold coin, and was so heavy that
four men bent underneath its weight.
The horrid thing seems to bring nothing but murder and
misfortune to those who have anything to do with it, for
 Tarzan of the Apes |
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 Alkahest by Honore de Balzac: At the beginning of the nineteenth century, after vicissitudes which
are of no interest to our present purpose, the family of Claes was
represented at Douai in the person of Monsieur Balthazar Claes-Molina,
Comte de Nourho, who preferred to be called simply Balthazar Claes. Of
the immense fortune amassed by his ancestors, who had kept in motion
over a thousand looms, there remained to him some fifteen thousand
francs a year from landed property in the arrondissement of Douai, and
the house in the rue de Paris, whose furniture in itself was a
fortune. As to the family possessions in Leon, they had been in
litigation between the Molinas of Douai and the branch of the family
which remained in Spain. The Molinas of Leon won the domain and
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