| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from House of Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne: When Phoebe was quite dressed, she peeped out of the window,
and saw a rosebush in the garden. Being a very tall one, and of
luxuriant growth, it had been propped up against the side of the
house, and was literally covered with a rare and very beautiful
species of white rose. A large portion of them, as the girl
afterwards discovered, had blight or mildew at their hearts; but,
viewed at a fair distance, the whole rosebush looked as if it had
been brought from Eden that very summer, together with the mould
in which it grew. The truth was, nevertheless, that it had been
planted by Alice Pyncheon,--she was Phoebe's great-great-grand-aunt,
--in soil which, reckoning only its cultivation as a garden-plat,
House of Seven Gables |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Oscar Wilde Miscellaneous by Oscar Wilde: Let this mean room be as that mighty stage
Whereon kings die, and our ignoble lives
Become the stakes God plays for.
I do not know
Why I speak thus. My ride has wearied me.
And my horse stumbled thrice, which is an omen
That bodes not good to any.
Alas! my lord,
How poor a bargain is this life of man,
And in how mean a market are we sold!
When we are born our mothers weep, but when
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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 The Forged Coupon by Leo Tolstoy: the roof. The sentry was approaching. Vassily
lay motionless. The sentry did not notice him,
and passed on. Vassily leaped to his feet; the
iron roof cracked under him. Another step or
two, and he would reach the wall. He could
touch it with his hand now. He leaned forward
with one hand, then with the other, stretched out
his body as far as he could, and found himself
on the wall. Only, not to break his legs in jump-
ing down, Vassily turned round, remained hang-
ing in the air by his hands, stretched himself out,
The Forged Coupon |
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 Ball at Sceaux by Honore de Balzac: announced to him his nomination as marechal de camp, or brigadier-
general, under a rule which allowed the officers of the Catholic
armies to count the twenty submerged years of Louis XVIII.'s reign as
years of service. Some days later he further received, without any
solicitation, ex officio, the crosses of the Legion of Honor and of
Saint-Louis.
Shaken in his determination by these successive favors, due, as he
supposed, to the monarch's remembrance, he was no longer satisfied
with taking his family, as he had piously done every Sunday, to cry
"Vive le Roi" in the hall of the Tuileries when the royal family
passed through on their way to chapel; he craved the favor of a
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