| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Case of The Lamp That Went Out by Grace Isabel Colbron and Augusta Groner: but continued to live in the old mansion with the mansard roof.
Her father was with her. The brother Theobald, the cause of all
this suffering to those who had shielded him at the expense of
their own happiness, had at last done the only good deed of his
life - had put an end to his useless existence with his own hand.
Father and daughter waited patiently for the return of the man
who had sinned and suffered for their sake. They spoke of him
only in terms of the tenderest affection and respect.
And indeed, seldom has any condemned murderer met with the respect
of the entire community as Herbert Thorne did. The tone of the
newspapers, and public opinion, evinced by hundreds of letters from
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Light of Western Stars by Zane Grey: Then he put the black to the descent.
If there had been a trail left by the leading cowboys, Stewart
did not follow it. He led off to the right, zigzagging an
intricate course through the roughest ground Madeline had ever
ridden over. He crashed through cedars, threaded a tortuous way
among boulders, made his horse slide down slanting banks of soft
earth, picked a slow and cautious progress across weathered
slopes of loose rock. Madeline followed, finding in this ride a
tax on strength and judgment. On an ordinary horse she never
could have kept in Stewart's trail. It was dust and heat, a
parching throat, that caused Madeline to think of time; and she
The Light of Western Stars |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Call of the Canyon by Zane Grey: "Because something here's been killed," he replied, and put his hand to his
heart.
"Your faith? Your love of--of everything? Did the war kill it?"
"I'd gotten over that, maybe," he said, drearily, with his somber eyes on
space that seemed lettered for him. "But she half murdered it--and they did
the rest."
"They? Whom do you mean, Rust?"
"Why, Carley, I mean the people I lost my leg for!" he replied, with
terrible softness.
"The British? The French?" she queried, in bewilderment.
"No!" he cried, and turned his face to the wall.
The Call of the Canyon |
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 Travels with a Donkey in the Cevenne by Robert Louis Stevenson: some thought of my own had come and gone unnoticed, and yet done me
good. For some thoughts, which sure would be the most beautiful,
vanish before we can rightly scan their features; as though a god,
travelling by our green highways, should but ope the door, give one
smiling look into the house, and go again for ever. Was it Apollo,
or Mercury, or Love with folded wings? Who shall say? But we go
the lighter about our business, and feel peace and pleasure in our
hearts.
I dined with a pair of Catholics. They agreed in the condemnation
of a young man, a Catholic, who had married a Protestant girl and
gone over to the religion of his wife. A Protestant born they
|
