| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald: Finn. Together we scrutinized the twelve lemon cakes from the delicatessen
shop.
"Will they do?" I asked.
"Of course, of course! They're fine!" and he added hollowly, ". . .old
sport."
The rain cooled about half-past three to a damp mist, through which
occasional thin drops swam like dew. Gatsby looked with vacant eyes
through a copy of Clay's ECONOMICS, starting at the Finnish tread that
shook the kitchen floor, and peering toward the bleared windows from time
to time as if a series of invisible but alarming happenings were taking
place outside. Finally he got up and informed me, in an uncertain voice,
The Great Gatsby |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Catherine de Medici by Honore de Balzac: the Duc d'Urbino, father of Catherine, Pope Leo X., Pope Clement VII.,
and Alessandro, not Duke of Florence, as historians call him, but Duke
/della citta di Penna/, a title given by Pope Clement VII., as a half-
way station to that of Grand-duke of Tuscany.
From Lorenzo are descended the Florentine Brutus Lorenzino, who killed
Alessandro, Cosmo, the first grand-duke, and all the sovereigns of
Tuscany till 1737, at which period the house became extinct.
But neither of the two branches--the branch Cosmo and the branch
Lorenzo--reigned through their direct and legitimate lines until the
close of the sixteenth century, when the grand-dukes of Tuscany began
to succeed each other peacefully. Alessandro de' Medici, he to whom
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