| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Touchstone by Edith Wharton: V
The little house, as Glennard strolled up to it between the trees,
seemed no more than a gay tent pitched against the sunshine. It
had the crispness of a freshly starched summer gown, and the
geraniums on the veranda bloomed as simultaneously as the flowers
in a bonnet. The garden was prospering absurdly. Seed they had
sown at random--amid laughing counter-charges of incompetence--had
shot up in fragrant defiance of their blunders. He smiled to see
the clematis unfolding its punctual wings about the porch. The
tiny lawn was smooth as a shaven cheek, and a crimson rambler
mounted to the nursery-window of a baby who never cried. A breeze
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from An Historical Mystery by Honore de Balzac: had often troubled Laurence, was then explained. After this purchase
the marquise, who lived at Cinq-Cygne and economized on her own
account for her children, spent her winters in Paris,--all the more
willingly because her daughter Berthe and her son Paul were now of an
age when their education required the resources of Paris.
Madame de Cinq-Cygne went but little into society. Her husband could
not be ignorant of the regrets which lay in her tender heart; but he
showed her always the most exquisite delicacy, and died having loved
no other woman. This noble soul, not fully understood for a period of
time but to which the generous daughter of the Cinq-Cygnes returned in
his last years as true a love as that he gave to her, was completely
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