| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte by Karl Marx: House-freedom as a generalization, the abolition of freedom as a
specification. Accordingly, so long as the name of freedom was
respected, and only its real enforcement was prevented in a legal way,
of course the constitutional existence of freedom remained uninjured,
untouched, however completely its common existence might be
extinguished.
This Constitution, so ingeniously made invulnerable, was, however, like
Achilles, vulnerable at one point: not in its heel, but in its head, or
rather, in the two heads into which it ran out-the Legislative Assembly,
on the one hand, and the President on the other. Run through the
Constitution and it will be found that only those paragraphs wherein 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 The Europeans by Henry James: of flowers; the perfume was most agreeable, but they were occasionally
an inconvenience. One could trust him, at any rate, round all
the corners of the world; and, withal, he was not absolutely simple,
which would have been excess; he was only relatively simple,
which was quite enough for the Baroness.
Lizzie reappeared to say that her mother would now be happy to receive
Madame Munster; and the Baroness followed her to Mrs. Acton's apartment.
Eugenia reflected, as she went, that it was not the affectation
of impertinence that made her dislike this young lady, for on
that ground she could easily have beaten her. It was not an
aspiration on the girl's part to rivalry, but a kind of laughing,
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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 Montezuma's Daughter by H. Rider Haggard: single boulder came rushing from on high, and falling on a horse,
killed him, then rebounding, carried dismay and wounds to those
behind. Another followed, and yet another, and I grew glad at
heart, for it seemed to me that the danger was over, and that for
the second time my strategy had succeeded.
But suddenly from above there came a sound other than that of the
rushing rocks, the sound of men joining in battle, that grew and
grew till the air was full of its tumult, then something whirled
down from on high. I looked; it was no stone, but a man, one of my
own men. Indeed he was but as the first rain-drop of a shower.
Alas! I saw the truth; I had been outwitted. The Spaniards, old in
Montezuma's Daughter |
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 House of Mirth by Edith Wharton: at the corner of Sixth Avenue. She had meant to take another
street: she had usually done so of late. But today her steps were
irresistibly drawn toward the flaring plate-glass comer; she
tried to take the lower crossing, but a laden dray crowded her
back, and she struck across the street obliquely, reaching the
sidewalk just opposite the chemist's door.
Over the counter she caught the eye of the clerk who had waited
on her before, and slipped the prescription into his hand. There
could be no question about the prescription: it was a copy of one
of Mrs. Hatch's, obligingly furnished by that lady's chemist.
Lily was confident that the clerk would fill it without
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