| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Alkahest by Honore de Balzac: happiness of getting him back proved as dangerous an excitement of
feeling to his wife as her fears of the preceding night. She kept
silence and dared not question him, for when she did so on the
occasion of his first absence, he answered with an air of surprise:--
"Well, what of it? Can I not take a walk?"
Passions never deceive. Madame Claes's anxieties corroborated the
rumors she had taken so much pains to deny. The experience of her
youth had taught her to understand the polite pity of the world.
Resolved not to undergo it a second time, she withdrew more and more
into the privacy of her own house, now deserted by society and even by
her nearest friends.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Maggie: A Girl of the Streets by Stephen Crane: obstruct its mission or take a wheel off.
And, perhaps, if the god-driver had an ungovernable desire to
step down, put up his flame-colored fists and manfully dispute the
right of way, he would have probably been immediately opposed by a
scowling mortal with two sets of very hard knuckles.
It is possible, perhaps, that this young man would have
derided, in an axle-wide alley, the approach of a flying ferry
boat. Yet he achieved a respect for a fire engine. As one charged
toward his truck, he would drive fearfully upon a sidewalk,
threatening untold people with annihilation. When an engine would
strike a mass of blocked trucks, splitting it into fragments, as a
Maggie: A Girl of the Streets |
