| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Commission in Lunacy by Honore de Balzac: presence the doctor and the judge now found themselves is necessary
for an understanding of her interview with Popinot.
Madame d'Espard had, for the last seven years, been very much the
fashion in Paris, where Fashion can raise and drop by turns various
personages who, now great and now small, that is to say, in view or
forgotten, are at last quite intolerable--as discarded ministers are,
and every kind of decayed sovereignty. These flatterers of the past,
odious with their stale pretensions, know everything, speak ill of
everything, and, like ruined profligates, are friends with all the
world. Since her husband had separated from her in 1815, Madame
d'Espard must have married in the beginning of 1812. Her children,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The King of the Golden River by John Ruskin: all his strength, but Hans only laughed at him and, advising him to
make himself comfortable till he came back again, shouldered his
basket, shook the bottle of holy water in Schwartz's face till it
frothed again, and marched off in the highest spirits in the world.
It was indeed a morning that might have made anyone happy, even
with no Golden River to seek for. Level lines of dewy mist lay
stretched along the valley, out of which rose the massy mountains,
their lower cliffs in pale gray shadow, hardly distinguishable from
the floating vapor but gradually ascending till they caught the
sunlight, which ran in sharp touches of ruddy color along the
angular crags, and pierced, in long, level rays, through their
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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 Chita: A Memory of Last Island by Lafcadio Hearn: kept his feet; all marvelled at the madness of the captain.
But Captain Abraham Smith was not mad. A veteran American
sailor, he had learned to know the great Gulf as scholars know
deep books by heart: he knew the birthplace of its tempests, the
mystery of its tides, the omens of its hurricanes. While lying
at Brashear City he felt the storm had not yet reached its
highest, vaguely foresaw a mighty peril, and resolved to wait no
longer for a lull. "Boys," he said, "we've got to take her out
in spite of Hell!" And they "took her out." Through all the
peril, his men stayed by him and obeyed him. By midmorning the
wind had deepened to a roar,--lowering sometimes to a rumble,
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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 Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde: CECILY. How nice of you to like me so much after we have known
each other such a comparatively short time. Pray sit down.
GWENDOLEN. [Still standing up.] I may call you Cecily, may I not?
CECILY. With pleasure!
GWENDOLEN. And you will always call me Gwendolen, won't you?
CECILY. If you wish.
GWENDOLEN. Then that is all quite settled, is it not?
CECILY. I hope so. [A pause. They both sit down together.]
GWENDOLEN. Perhaps this might be a favourable opportunity for my
mentioning who I am. My father is Lord Bracknell. You have never
heard of papa, I suppose?
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