| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Vendetta by Honore de Balzac: days flowed rapidly by, filled with occupation and the joys of their
love. At night, after working all day, they met with delight in
Ginevra's studio. Music refreshed their weariness. No expression of
regret or melancholy obscured the happy features of the young wife,
and never did she utter a complaint. She appeared to her Luigi with a
smile upon her lips and her eyes beaming. Each cherished a ruling
thought which would have made them take pleasure in a labor still more
severe; Ginevra said in her heart that she worked for Luigi, and Luigi
the same for Ginevra.
Sometimes, in the absence of her husband, the thought of the perfect
happiness she might have had if this life of love could have been
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Jungle by Upton Sinclair: serve breakfast after 7 A.M."
"I am very hungry," said Jurgis gravely; "I would like to buy
some food."
"Ask the woman," said the farmer, nodding over his shoulder. The
"woman" was more tractable, and for a dime Jurgis secured two
thick sandwiches and a piece of pie and two apples. He walked
off eating the pie, as the least convenient thing to carry. In a
few minutes he came to a stream, and he climbed a fence and
walked down the bank, along a woodland path. By and by he found
a comfortable spot, and there he devoured his meal, slaking his
thirst at the stream. Then he lay for hours, just gazing and
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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 Shakespeare's Sonnets by William Shakespeare: I should in thought control your times of pleasure,
Or at your hand the account of hours to crave,
Being your vassal, bound to stay your leisure!
O! let me suffer, being at your beck,
The imprison'd absence of your liberty;
And patience, tame to sufferance, bide each check,
Without accusing you of injury.
Be where you list, your charter is so strong
That you yourself may privilage your time
To what you will; to you it doth belong
Yourself to pardon of self-doing crime.
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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 Historical Lecturers and Essays by Charles Kingsley: enchanting sites--meadows, vines, olives, green champaigns;
mountains and hills, rivers, brooks, lagoons, and the sea.
Everywhere a luxuriant vegetation--everywhere the richest production
of the land and the water. Hail to thee sweet and dear city! Hail,
happy abode of Apollo, who spreadest afar the light of the glory of
thy name!"
"This fine tirade," says Dr. Maurice Raynaud--from whose charming
book on the "Doctors of the Time of Moliere" I quote--"is not, as
one might think, the translation of a piece of poetry. It is simply
part of a public oration by Francois Fanchon, one of the most
illustrious chancellors of the faculty of medicine of Montpellier in
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