| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from In the South Seas by Robert Louis Stevenson: needful to forbid the art. Their songs and dances were numerous
(and the law has had to abolish them by the dozen). They now face
empty-handed the tedium of their uneventful days; and who shall
pity them? The least rigorous will say that they were justly
served.
Death alone could not satisfy Marquesan vengeance: the flesh must
be eaten. The chief who seized Mr. Whalon preferred to eat him;
and he thought he had justified the wish when he explained it was a
vengeance. Two or three years ago, the people of a valley seized
and slew a wretch who had offended them. His offence, it is to be
supposed, was dire; they could not bear to leave their vengeance
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Merry Men by Robert Louis Stevenson: implies the dangerous quality of imagination. A man of imagination
is never moral; he outsoars literal demarcations and reviews life
under too many shifting lights to rest content with the invidious
distinctions of the law!'
'But you always say - at least, so I understood you' - said madame,
'that these lads display no imagination whatever.'
'My dear, they displayed imagination, and of a very fantastic
order, too,' returned the Doctor, 'when they embraced their
beggarly profession. Besides - and this is an argument exactly
suited to your intellectual level - many of them are English and
American. Where else should we expect to find a thief? - And now
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