| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Drama on the Seashore by Honore de Balzac: know what; he staggered about like a man who can't carry his wine.
Then he went away and was gone ten days, and after he returned he put
himself where you saw him, and since he has been there he has never
said one word."
The fisherman related this history rapidly and more simply than I can
write it. The lower classes make few comments as they relate a thing;
they tell the fact that strikes them, and present it as they felt it.
This tale was made as sharply incisive as the blow of an axe.
"I shall not go to Batz," said Pauline, when we came to the upper
shore of the lake.
We returned to Croisic by the salt marshes, through the labyrinth of
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from In the Cage by Henry James: no!"
He sank back, quite blank, as if she had pushed him. "I mayn't see
you home?"
"No, no; let me go." He looked almost as if she had struck him,
but she didn't care; and the manner in which she spoke--it was
literally as if she were angry--had the force of a command. "Stay
where you are!"
"See here--see here!" he nevertheless pleaded.
"I won't give you up!" she cried once more--this time quite with
passion; on which she got away from him as fast as she could and
left him staring after her.
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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 A Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe: had from Heaven, that to me signified a kind of direction to venture;
and it occurred to me that if I had what I might call a direction to stay,
I ought to suppose it contained a promise of being preserved if I obeyed.
This lay close to me, and my mind seemed more and more encouraged
to stay than ever, and supported with a secret satisfaction
that I should be kept. Add to this, that, turning over the Bible which
lay before me, and while my thoughts were more than ordinarily
serious upon the question, I cried out, 'Well, I know not what to do;
Lord, direct me I' and the like; and at that juncture I happened to stop
turning over the book at the gist Psalm, and casting my eye on the
second verse, I read on to the seventh verse exclusive, and after that
A Journal of the Plague Year |
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 Somebody's Little Girl by Martha Young: with all the rest of her small belongings into the old trunk with
brass tacks in the leather, the old, old trunk that had belonged to
Sister Helen Vincula, did Bessie Bell know that it was herself,
little Bessie Bell, who was going away Somewhere.
* * *
* *
*
It was a very strange new world to Bessie Bell, that new world up on
the High Mountain.
She did not think the grand views off the edge of the high mountain
so strange. But she loved to look out on those views as she stood
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