| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Tanach: 1_Kings 15: 20 And Ben-hadad hearkened unto king Asa, and sent the captains of his armies against the cities of Israel, and smote Ijon, and Dan, and Abel-beth-maacah, and all Chinneroth, with all the land of Naphtali.
1_Kings 15: 21 And it came to pass, when Baasa heard thereof, that he left off building Ramah, and dwelt in Tirzah.
1_Kings 15: 22 Then king Asa made a proclamation unto all Judah; none was exempted; and they carried away the stones of Ramah, and the timber thereof, wherewith Baasa had builded; and king Asa built therewith Geba of Benjamin, and Mizpah.
1_Kings 15: 23 Now the rest of all the acts of Asa, and all his might, and all that he did, and the cities which he built, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah? But in the time of his old age he was diseased in his feet.
1_Kings 15: 24 And Asa slept with his fathers, and was buried with his fathers in the city of David his father; and Jehoshaphat his son reigned in his stead.
1_Kings 15: 25 And Nadab the son of Jeroboam began to reign over Israel in the second year of Asa king of Judah, and he reigned over Israel two years.
1_Kings 15: 26 And he did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD, and walked in the way of his father, and in his sin wherewith he made Israel to sin.
1_Kings 15: 27 And Baasa the son of Ahijah, of the house of Issachar, conspired against him; and Baasa smote him at Gibbethon, which belonged to the Philistines; for Nadab and all Israel were laying 
The Tanach |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge by Ambrose Bierce: ran straight away into a forest for a hundred yards, then,
curving, was lost to view. Doubtless there was an outpost
farther along. The other bank of the stream was open ground
-- a gentle slope topped with a stockade of vertical tree
trunks, loopholed for rifles, with a single embrasure
through which protruded the muzzle of a brass cannon
commanding the bridge. Midway up the slope between the
bridge and fort were the spectators -- a single company of
infantry in line, at "parade rest," the butts of their rifles
on the ground, the barrels inclining slightly backward
against the right shoulder, the hands crossed upon the stock.
An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge |
