| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Unconscious Comedians by Honore de Balzac: down there, for they tell me a fellow is certain to get a place if he
comes to Paris.' Hearing these words, Massol shuddered, and said to
himself that if he were weak enough to help this compatriot (to him
utterly unknown) he should have the whole department prone upon him,
his bell-rope would break, his valet leave him, he should have
difficulties with his landlord about the stairway, and the other
lodgers would assuredly complain of the smell of garlic pervading the
house. Consequently, he looked at his visitor as a butcher looks at a
sheep whose throat he intends to cut. But whether the rustic
comprehended the stab of that glance or not, he went on to say (so
Massol told me), 'I've as much ambition as other men. I will never go
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Somebody's Little Girl by Martha Young: straps and buttons behind.
For just one hour every day all the little tiny girls played in the
sand, and while they played Sister Mary Felice sat on a willow-
wrought bench and watched them play.
Then when that hour was exactly passed Sister Angela always came
with a basket of netted canes, an Indian basket, on her arm. In the
Indian basket were little cakes--such nice little cakes--always they
had caraway seeds in them.
One day Sister Mary Felice said: ``Sister Angela, did Sister
Ignatius put too many caraway seeds in the cakes this time?''
Sister Angela said: ``I think not, Sister Mary Felice. Will you try
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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 Royalty Restored/London Under Charles II by J. Fitzgerald Molloy: to his choicest friends.
Here, whilst drinking deep of ruddy wine from goblets of old
gold, he narrated his strange experiences, and illustrated them
with flashes of his wit. for it was the habit of this eccentric
earl, when refinements of the court began to pall upon him, or
his absence from Whitehall became a necessity, to seek fresh
adventure and intrigue disguised as a porter, a beggar, or a
ballad-monger. And so carefully did he hide his identity in the
character he assumed, that his most intimate friends failed to
recognise his personality.
No doubt the follies in which he indulged were in some measure
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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 Philosophy 4 by Owen Wister: roseate and healthy than most of the anxious band whose steps were
converging to that same gate of judgment. Oscar, meeting them on the
way, gave them his deferential "Good morning," and trusted that the
gentlemen felt easy. Quite so, they told him, and bade him feel easy
about his pay, for which they were, of course, responsible. Oscar
wished them good luck and watched them go to their desks with his Iittle
eyes, smiling in his particular manner. Then he dismissed them from his
mind, and sat with a faint remnant of his smile, fluently writing his
perfectly accurate answer to the first question upon the examination
paper.
Here is that paper. You will not be able to answer all the questions,
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