| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Plutarch's Lives by A. H. Clough: the sea beyond Babylon; and from the Caspian sea, the Albanians and
the Iberians their neighbors, and not a few of the free people,
without kings, living about the Araxes, by entreaty and hire also
came together to him; and all the king's feasts and councils rang
of nothing but expectations, boastings, and barbaric threatenings,
Taxiles went in danger of his life, for giving counsel against
fighting, and it was imputed to envy in Mithridates thus to
discourage him from so glorious an enterprise. Therefore Tigranes
would by no means tarry for him, for fear he should share in the
glory, but marched on with all his army, lamenting to his friends,
as it is said, that he should fight with Lucullus alone, and not
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Mother by Owen Wister: "It was the thought of that lady which brought from Ethel the only note
of complaint she uttered in my presence during that whole dreary month."
"We were spending Sunday with a house party at Hyde Park; and driving to
church, we passed an avenue gate with a lodge. 'Rockhurst, sir,' said the
coachman. 'Whose place?' I inquired. 'The old Beverly place, sir.' Ethel
heard him tell me this; and as we went on, we saw a carriage and pair
coming down the avenue toward the gate with that look which horses always
seem to have when they are taking the family to church on Sunday morning."
"'If I see her,' said Ethel to me as we entered the door, 'I shall be
unable to say my prayers.'"
"But only young people came into the Beverly pew, and Ethel said 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 A Distinguished Provincial at Paris by Honore de Balzac: nothing and saw nothing; Coralie made him swallow several cups of tea,
and left him to sleep.
"Did the porter see us? Was there anyone else about?" she asked.
"No; I was sitting up for you."
"Does Victoire know anything?"
"Rather not!" returned Berenice.
Ten hours later Lucien awoke to meet Coralie's eyes. She had watched
by him as he slept; he knew it, poet that he was. It was almost noon,
but she still wore the delicate dress, abominably stained, which she
meant to lay up as a relic. Lucien understood all the self-sacrifice
and delicacy of love, fain of its reward. He looked into Coralie's
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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 Human Drift by Jack London: ears as my Outlaw. She indicated Maid's exquisitely thin
shinbone. I measured the Outlaw's. It was equally thin,
although, I insinuated, possibly more durable. This stabbed
Charmian's pride. Of course her near-thoroughbred Maid, carrying
the blood of "old" Lexington, Morella, and a streak of the super-
enduring Morgan, could run, walk, and work my unregistered Outlaw
into the ground; and that was the very precise reason why such a
paragon of a saddle animal should not be degraded by harness.
So it was that Charmian remained obdurate, until, one day, I got
her behind the Outlaw for a forty-mile drive. For every inch of
those forty miles the Outlaw kicked and jumped, in between the
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