| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz by L. Frank Baum: the others.
"Let's go down again!" he said, in his hoarse voice.
"Nonsense!" snapped the tired Wizard. "What's the matter with you,
old man?"
"Everything," grumbled the horse. "I've taken a look at this place,
and it's no fit country for real creatures to go to. Everything's
dead, up there--no flesh or blood or growing thing anywhere."
"Never mind;. we can't turn back," said Dorothy; "and we don't intend
to stay there, anyhow."
"It's dangerous," growled Jim, in a stubborn tone.
"See here, my good steed," broke in the Wizard, "little Dorothy and I
Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Bucky O'Connor by William MacLeod Raine: fear all the time. Still--I can't betray them. They thought I
went in freely with them--all but Hardman. It wouldn't be right
for me to tell what I know. I've got to make you see that, dear."
"You'll not need to argue that with me, honey. I see it. You must
keep quiet. Don't tell anybody else what you've told me."
"And will they put me in the penitentiary when the rest go
there?"
"Not while Bucky O'Connor is alive and kicking," he told her
confidently.
But the form in which he had expressed his feeling was
unfortunate. It brought them back to the menace of their
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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 The Commission in Lunacy by Honore de Balzac: waiting for you."
"Why, Monsieur le President, is anything wrong?"
"A mere silly trifle," said the President. "The Keeper of the Seals,
with whom I had the honor of dining yesterday, led me apart into a
corner. He had heard that you had been to tea with Madame d'Espard, in
whose case you were employed to make inquiries. He gave me to
understand that it would be as well that you should not sit on this
case----"
"But, Monsieur le President, I can prove that I left Madame d'Espard's
house at the moment when tea was brought in. And my conscience----"
"Yes, yes; the whole Bench, the two Courts, all the profession know
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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 Pupil by Henry James: in her preoccupation, forgot, as she glanced round, to be ashamed
of giving him such a horrid room. What Mrs. Moreen's ardour now
bore upon was the design of persuading him that in the first place
she was very good-natured to bring him fifty francs, and that in
the second, if he would only see it, he was really too absurd to
expect to be paid. Wasn't he paid enough without perpetual money -
wasn't he paid by the comfortable luxurious home he enjoyed with
them all, without a care, an anxiety, a solitary want? Wasn't he
sure of his position, and wasn't that everything to a young man
like him, quite unknown, with singularly little to show, the ground
of whose exorbitant pretensions it had never been easy to discover?
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