| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from An Historical Mystery by Honore de Balzac: obtained. In 1806 France was still too near the Supreme Being of 1793
to talk about divine justice; he therefore spared the jury all
reference to the intervention of heaven; but he said that earthly
justice would be on the watch for the mysterious accomplices who had
set the senator at liberty, and he sat down, confidently awaiting the
verdict.
The jury believed there was a mystery, but they were all persuaded
that it came from the prisoners, who were probably concealing some
matter of a private interest of great importance to them.
Monsieur de Grandville, to whom a plot or machination of some kind was
quite evident, rose; but he seemed discouraged,--less, however, by the
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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 Gods of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs: took a stand beside me. He was a valorous soldier, Gur Tus
by name, and together we kept the now thoroughly frightened
troops in the semblance of order and rescued many that
would have drowned otherwise.
Djor Kantos, son of Kantos Kan, and a padwar of the
fifth utan joined us when his utan reached the opening
through which the men were fleeing. Thereafter not a man
was lost of all the hundreds that remained to pass from the
main corridor to the branch.
As the last utan was filing past us the waters had risen
until they surged about our necks, but we clasped hands
The Gods of Mars |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Lady Baltimore by Owen Wister: not fallen, and it is drowsily warm; but it wasn't so much of nature that
she, in her harmonious lustre, reminded me, as of some beautiful
silken-shaded lamp, from which color rather than light came with subdued
ampleness.
I saw her eyes settle upon the flowers that I had brought Eliza La Heu.
"How beautiful those are!" she remarked.
"Is there something that you wish?" inquired Miss La Heu, always
miraculously sweet.
"Some of your good things for lunch; a very little, if you will be so
kind."
I had gone back to my table while the "very little" was being selected,
and I felt, in spite of how slightly she counted me, that it would be in-
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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 Amazing Interlude by Mary Roberts Rinehart: panoply of war, but there had been movement, the beating of a drum, the
sharp cries of officers as the lines re-formed.
Here there were no lines. Just such a stream of men as at home might
issue at night from a coal mine, too weary for speech. Only here they
were packed together closely, and they did not speak, and some of them
were wounded.
"There are so many!" she whispered to Henri. "A hundred such efforts as
mine would not be enough."
"I would to God there were more!" Henri replied, through shut teeth.
"Listen, mademoiselle," he said later. "You cannot do all the kind
work of the world. But you can do your part. And you will start by
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