| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Persuasion by Jane Austen: exclaimed in the bitterest agony--
"Oh God! her father and mother!"
"A surgeon!" said Anne.
He caught the word; it seemed to rouse him at once, and saying only--
"True, true, a surgeon this instant," was darting away,
when Anne eagerly suggested--
"Captain Benwick, would not it be better for Captain Benwick?
He knows where a surgeon is to be found."
Every one capable of thinking felt the advantage of the idea,
and in a moment (it was all done in rapid moments) Captain Benwick had
resigned the poor corpse-like figure entirely to the brother's care,
 Persuasion |
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 Emma McChesney & Co. by Edna Ferber: don't want to be a shipping-clerk all his life. He's crazy
about mechanics and that kind of stuff. But the books that he
needs cost a lot. Don't you suppose I'd be proud to feel that
the extra money I'd earned would lift him up where he could have
a chance to be something! But Henry is dead set against it. He
says he is the one that's going to earn the money around here. I
try to tell him that I'm used to using my mind. He laughs and
pinches my cheek and tells me to use it thinking about him." She
stopped suddenly and regarded Emma with conscience-stricken
eyes. "You don't think I'm running down Henry, do you? My
goodness, I don't want you to think that I'd change back again
 Emma McChesney & Co. |