| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Roads of Destiny by O. Henry: professional "jobs," and he thought he could safely venture out.
After breakfast quite a family party went downtown together--Mr.
Adams, Annabel, Jimmy, and Annabel's married sister with her two
little girls, aged five and nine. They came by the hotel where Jimmy
still boarded, and he ran up to his room and brought along his suit-
case. Then they went on to the bank. There stood Jimmy's horse and
buggy and Dolph Gibson, who was going to drive him over to the
railroad station.
All went inside the high, carved oak railings into the banking-room--
Jimmy included, for Mr. Adams's future son-in-law was welcome
anywhere. The clerks were pleased to be greeted by the good-looking,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Black Beauty by Anna Sewell: but she said, "I will wait for you here, and you can hang Auster's rein
on the gate."
He looked at her doubtfully. "I will not be five minutes," he said.
"Oh, do not hurry yourself; Lizzie and I shall not run away from you."
He hung my rein on one of the iron spikes, and was soon hidden
among the trees. Lizzie was standing quietly by the side of the road
a few paces off, with her back to me. My young mistress was sitting easily
with a loose rein, humming a little song. I listened to my rider's footsteps
until they reached the house, and heard him knock at the door.
There was a meadow on the opposite side of the road, the gate of which
stood open; just then some cart horses and several young colts
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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 Macbeth by William Shakespeare: Rosse. Alas poore Countrey,
Almost affraid to know it selfe. It cannot
Be call'd our Mother, but our Graue; where nothing
But who knowes nothing, is once seene to smile:
Where sighes, and groanes, and shrieks that rent the ayre
Are made, not mark'd: Where violent sorrow seemes
A Moderne extasie: The Deadmans knell,
Is there scarse ask'd for who, and good mens liues
Expire before the Flowers in their Caps,
Dying, or ere they sicken
Macd. Oh Relation; too nice, and yet too true
Macbeth |
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 My Bondage and My Freedom by Frederick Douglass: now; and as a fugitive slave lecturer, I had the advantage of
being a _"brand new fact"_--the first one out. Up to that time,
a colored man was deemed a fool who confessed himself a runaway
slave, not only because of the danger to which he exposed himself
of being retaken, but because it was a confession of a very _low_
origin! Some of my colored friends in New Bedford thought very
badly of my wisdom for thus exposing and degrading myself. The
only precaution I took, at the beginning, to prevent Master
Thomas from knowing where I was, and what I was about, was the
withholding my former name, my master's name, and the name of the
state and county from which I came. During the first three or
My Bondage and My Freedom |
