| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Richard III by William Shakespeare: But you have power in me as in a kinsman.
YORK. I pray you, uncle, give me this dagger.
GLOUCESTER. My dagger, little cousin? With all my heart!
PRINCE. A beggar, brother?
YORK. Of my kind uncle, that I know will give,
And being but a toy, which is no grief to give.
GLOUCESTER. A greater gift than that I'll give my cousin.
YORK. A greater gift! O, that's the sword to it!
GLOUCESTER. Ay, gentle cousin, were it light enough.
YORK. O, then, I see you will part but with light gifts:
In weightier things you'll say a beggar nay.
Richard III |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Maitre Cornelius by Honore de Balzac: precedes me there below," he said, pointing to the floor with a
dreadful gesture.
"Enough!" cried Louis XI., who did not like to hear of death.
"I make you my heir. I care for nothing now. Here are my keys. Hang
me, if that's your good pleasure. Take all, ransack the house; it is
full of gold. I give up all to you--"
"Come, come, crony," replied Louis XI., who was partly touched by the
sight of this strange suffering, "we shall find your treasure some
fine night, and the sight of such riches will give you heart to live.
I will come back in the course of this week--"
"As you please, sire."
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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 Catherine de Medici by Honore de Balzac: Catholics," cried the jeweller.
"We are too old, you and I, to see the triumph of the Parisian
bourgeoisie, but it will triumph, I tell you, in times to come as it
did of yore. Ha! the king must rest upon it in order to resist, and we
have always sold him our help dear. The last time, all the burghers
were ennobled, and he gave them permission to buy seignorial estates
and take titles from the land without special letters from the king.
You and I, grandsons of the Goix through our mothers, are not we as
good as any lord?"
These words were so alarming to the jeweller and the two women that
they were followed by a dead silence. The ferments of 1789 were
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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 Chita: A Memory of Last Island by Lafcadio Hearn: she parted the tufts of the thickening verdure. As she went on,
the bitter-weeds disappeared;--jointed grasses and sinewy dark
plants of a taller growth rose above her head: she was almost
deafened by the storm of insect shrilling, and the mosquitoes
became very wicked. All at once something long and black and
heavy wriggled almost from under her naked feet,--squirming so
horribly that for a minute or two she could not move for fright.
But it slunk away somewhere, and hid itself; the weeds it had
shaken ceased to tremble in its wake; and her courage returned.
She felt such an exquisite and fearful pleasure in the
gratification of that naughty curiosity! Then, quite
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