| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Figure in the Carpet by Henry James: bare brow. It always happened that I turned away with a settled
conviction from these unpeopled expanses, which seemed to complete
each other geographically and to symbolise together Drayton Deane's
want of voice, want of form. He simply hadn't the art to use what
he knew; he literally was incompetent to take up the duty where
Corvick had left it. I went still further - it was the only
glimpse of happiness I had. I made up my mind that the duty didn't
appeal to him. He wasn't interested, he didn't care. Yes, it
quite comforted me to believe him too stupid to have joy of the
thing I lacked. He was as stupid after as he had been before, and
that deepened for me the golden glory in which the mystery was
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Man of Business by Honore de Balzac: police-courts, induced his master to receive him. Can you see the man
of business, with an uneasy eye, a bald forehead, and scarcely any
hair on his head, standing in his threadbare jacket and muddy boots--"
"What a picture of a Dun!" cried Lousteau.
"--standing before the Count, that image of flaunting Debt, in his
blue flannel dressing-gown, slippers worked by some Marquise or other,
trousers of white woolen stuff, and a dazzling shirt? There he stood,
with a gorgeous cap on his black dyed hair, playing with the tassels
at his waist--"
" 'Tis a bit of genre for anybody who knows what the pretty little
morning room, hung with silk and full of valuable paintings, where
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