| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson:
Treasure Island |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Fisherman's Luck by Henry van Dyke: the fish weighed and spread out on the grass. Several times she
went with Beekman in the canoe to Hardscrabble Point, and showed
distinct evidences of pleasure when he caught large trout. The last
day of the season, when he returned from a successful expedition to
Roach River and Lily Bay, she inquired with some particularity about
the results of his sport; and in the evening, as the company sat
before the great open fire in the hall of the hotel, she was heard
to use this information with considerable skill in putting down Mrs.
Minot Peabody of Boston, who was recounting the details of her
husband's catch at Spencer Pond. Cornelia was not a person to be
contented with the back seat, even in fish-stories.
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Street of Seven Stars by Mary Roberts Rinehart: future. Perhaps, surely, everything would have been settled,
without reason, had he only once taken the girl in his arms, told
her she was the breath of life itself to him. But adversity,
while it had roused his fighting spirit in everything else, had
sapped his confidence.
He had found the letter on his dressing-table, and he found
himself confronting his image over it, a tall, stooping figure, a
tired, lined face, a coat that bore the impress of many days with
a sick child's head against its breast.
So it was over. She had come back and gone again, and this time
he must let her go. Who was he to detain her? She would carry
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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 Beauty and The Beast by Bayard Taylor: roar like that of a wounded bull, and rushed into the castle. The
sound of breaking furniture, of crashing porcelain and shivered
glass, came from the state apartments: the domestics fell on their
knees and prayed; the Princess, who heard the noise and knew what
it portended, became almost insensible from fright.
One of the upper servants entered a chamber as the Prince was in
the act of demolishing a splendid malachite table, which had
escaped all his previous attacks. He was immediately greeted with
a cry of,--
"Send the Princess to me!"
"Her Highness is not able to leave her chamber," the man replied.
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