| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Young Forester by Zane Grey: saw the bear snuggling in a fork. His sharp ears stood up against the sky.
He was most anxiously gazing down at us.
"Wal, tumble him out of thar," said Hiram Bent.
With a natural impulse to shoot I raised my rifle, but the cub looked so
attractive and so helpless that I hesitated.
"I don't like to do it," I said. "Oh, I wish we could catch him alive!"
"Wal, I reckon we can."
"How?" I inquired, eagerly, and lowered my rifle.
"Are you good on the climb?"
"Climb? This tree? Why, with one hand. Back in Pennsylvania I climbed
shell-bark hickory-trees with the lowest limb fifty feet from the ground.
The Young Forester |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Some Reminiscences by Joseph Conrad: various seas and coasts--coasts of forests, of rocks, of sand
dunes--but no magic so perfect in its revelation of unsuspected
character, as though one were allowed to look upon the mystic
nature of material things. For hours I suppose no word was
spoken in that boat. The pilots seated in two rows facing each
other dozed with their arms folded and their chins resting upon
their breasts. They displayed a great variety of caps: cloth,
wool, leather, peaks, ear-flaps, tassels, with a picturesque
round beret or two pulled down over the brows; and one
grandfather, with a shaved, bony face and a great beak of a nose,
had a cloak with a hood which made him look in our midst like a
Some Reminiscences |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Selected Writings of Guy De Maupassant by Guy De Maupassant: Sam, who was awakened by the noise, began to howl as frightened
dogs do, and trotted all about the house trying to find out where
the danger came from. When he got to the door, he sniffed beneath
it, smelling vigorously, with his coat bristling and his tail
stiff while he growled angrily. Kunsi, who was terrified, jumped
up, and holding his chair by one leg, cried: "Don't come in,
don't come in, or I shall kill you." And the dog, excited by this
threat, barked angrily at that invisible enemy who defied his
master's voice. By degrees, however, he quieted down, came back
and stretched himself in front of the fire. But he was uneasy,
and kept his head up, and growled between his teeth.
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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 The Black Dwarf by Walter Scott: brawny, furnished with two muscular hands, and, where uncovered
in the eagerness of his labour, were shagged with coarse black
hair. It seemed as if nature had originally intended the
separate parts of his body to be the members of a giant, but had
afterwards capriciously assigned them to the person of a dwarf,
so ill did the length of his arms and the iron strength of his
frame correspond with the shortness of his stature. His clothing
was a sort of coarse brown tunic, like a monk's frock, girt round
him with a belt of seal-skin. On his head he had a cap made of
badger's skin, or some other rough fur, which added considerably
to the grotesque effect of his whole appearance, and overshadowed
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