| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Heart of the West by O. Henry: "What?" asked Webb, with a hopeful look in his pale-blue eyes.
"You're a prince-consort."
"Go easy," said Webb. "I never blackguarded you none."
"It's a title," explained Baldy, "up among the picture-cards; but it
don't take no tricks. I'll tell you, Webb. It's a brand they're got
for certain animals in Europe. Say that you or me or one of them Dutch
dukes marries in a royal family. Well, by and by our wife gets to be
queen. Are we king? Not in a million years. At the coronation
ceremonies we march between little casino and the Ninth Grand
Custodian of the Royal Hall Bedchamber. The only use we are is to
appear in photographs, and accept the responsibility for the heir-
Heart of the West |
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: are wisest. They are the magi.
End of this Project Gutenberg Etext of THE GIFT OF THE MAGI.
The Gift of the Magi |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Barlaam and Ioasaph by St. John of Damascus: ye say, why should ye not reach that thought of death by the
bones of the bodies that are now your own, and are soon to
perish, rather than by the bones of other men which have already
perished?"
The monk said, "Five reasons I gave thee, why we carry about
these relics; and thou, making answer to one only, art like to be
mocking us. But know thou well that the bones of them, that have
already departed this life, bring the thought of death more
vividly before us than do the bones of the living. But since
thou judgest otherwise, and since the bones of thine own body are
to thee a type of death, why dost thou not recollect thy latter
|
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 Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals by Charles Darwin: of command, were, of course, neither alarmed nor enraged.
From the several foregoing cases with respect to Man, there can,
I think, be no doubt that the contraction of the muscles round
the eyes, during violent expiration or when the expanded chest
is forcibly compressed, is, in some manner, intimately connected
with the secretion of tears. This holds good under widely
different emotions, and independently of any emotion. It is not,
of course, meant that tears cannot be secreted without the contraction
of these muscles; for it is notorious that they are often freely
shed with the eyelids not closed, and with the brows unwrinkled.
The contraction must be both involuntary and prolonged,
Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals |
