| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Boys' Life of Abraham Lincoln by Helen Nicolay: trait of the pioneer was his by blood and birth and training, and
was developed by the hardships of his lot to the mighty power
needed to guide our country through the struggle of the Civil
War.
The sense of equality was his also, for he grew from childhood to
manhood in a state of society where there were neither rich to
envy nor poor to despise, and where the gifts and hardships of
the forest were distributed without favor to each and all alike.
In the forest he learned charity, sympathy, helpfulness--in a
word neighborliness--for in that far-off frontier life all the
wealth of India, had a man possessed it, could not have bought
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Passion in the Desert by Honore de Balzac: the most horrible despair was infused into his soul. Before him
stretched an ocean without limit. The dark sand of the desert spread
further than eye could reach in every direction, and glittered like
steel struck with bright light. It might have been a sea of looking-
glass, or lakes melted together in a mirror. A fiery vapor carried up
in surging waves made a perpetual whirlwind over the quivering land.
The sky was lit with an Oriental splendor of insupportable purity,
leaving naught for the imagination to desire. Heaven and earth were on
fire.
The silence was awful in its wild and terrible majesty. Infinity,
immensity, closed in upon the soul from every side. Not a cloud in the
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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 Bucky O'Connor by William MacLeod Raine: hidden, it will be like looking for a needle in a haystack to put
his fat finger on us."
Bucky went singing up the stairway of the hotel to his room. He
was keen to get back to his little friend after the hazards of
the night, eager to see the brown eyes light up with joy at sight
of him and to hear the soft voice with the trailing inflection
drawl out its shy questions. So he took the stairs three at a
time, with a song on his lips and in his heart.
"'Tis you shall reign, shall reign alone
My dark Rosaleen! My own Rosaleen!
'Tis you shall have the golden throne,
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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 Ancient Regime by Charles Kingsley: a cold-water cure. How sad to see the village, church and all,
built up again brand-new, and whitewashed to the very steeple-top;--
a new school at the town-end--a new crucifix by the wayside. How
sad to see the old folk well clothed in the fabrics of England or
Belgium, doing an easy trade in milk and fruit, because the land
they till has become their own, and not the prince's; while their
sons are thriving farmers on the prairies of the far West. Very
unpicturesque, no doubt, is wealth and progress, peace and safety,
cleanliness and comfort. But they possess advantages unknown to the
Ancien Regime, which was, if nothing else, picturesque. Men could
paint amusing and often pretty pictures of its people and its
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