| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Message by Honore de Balzac: countenance--a wizened, wrinkled, sunburned face, and long, sleek
locks of scanty gray hair; as to character--an incredible mixture
of homely sense and sheer silliness; of a rich man's overbearing
ways, and a total lack of manners; just the kind of husband who
is almost entirely led by his wife, yet imagines himself to be
the master; apt to domineer in trifles, and to let more important
things slip past unheeded--there you have the man!
But the Countess! Ah, how sharp and startling the contrast
between husband and wife! The Countess was a little woman, with a
flat, graceful figure and enchanting shape; so fragile, so dainty
was she, that you would have feared to break some bone if you so
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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 Silas Marner by George Eliot: purpose could not keep her spirit from failing. It was seven
o'clock, and by this time she was not very far from Raveloe, but she
was not familiar enough with those monotonous lanes to know how near
she was to her journey's end. She needed comfort, and she knew but
one comforter--the familiar demon in her bosom; but she hesitated
a moment, after drawing out the black remnant, before she raised it
to her lips. In that moment the mother's love pleaded for painful
consciousness rather than oblivion--pleaded to be left in aching
weariness, rather than to have the encircling arms benumbed so that
they could not feel the dear burden. In another moment Molly had
flung something away, but it was not the black remnant--it was an
Silas Marner |
