| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen: "Thank you; but will not your horse want rest?"
"Rest! He has only come three and twenty miles today;
all nonsense; nothing ruins horses so much as rest;
nothing knocks them up so soon. No, no; I shall exercise
mine at the average of four hours every day while I
am here."
"Shall you indeed!" said Catherine very seriously.
"That will be forty miles a day."
"Forty! Aye, fifty, for what I care. Well, I will
drive you up Lansdown tomorrow; mind, I am engaged."
"How delightful that will be!" cried Isabella,
Northanger Abbey |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Tales of the Klondyke by Jack London: prove-the-rule exception. Look at his woman, Unga,--tip the
scales at a hundred an' ten, clean meat an' nary ounce to spare.
She'd bank grit 'gainst his for all there was in him, an' see him,
an' go him better if it was possible. Nothing over the earth, or
in it, or under it, she wouldn't 'a' done."
"But she loved him," objected the engineer.
"'T ain't that. It--"
"Look you, brothers," broke in Sitka Charley from his seat on the
grub-box. "Ye have spoken of the streak of fat that runs in big
men's muscles, of the grit of women and the love, and ye have
spoken fair; but I have in mind things which happened when the
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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 Albert Savarus by Honore de Balzac: of iron. Physiologists and profound observers will tell you, perhaps
to your astonishment, that tempers, characteristics, wit, or genius
reappear in families at long intervals, precisely like what are known
as hereditary diseases. Thus talent, like the gout, sometimes skips
over two generations. We have an illustrious example of this
phenomenon in George Sand, in whom are resuscitated the force, the
power, and the imaginative faculty of the Marechal de Saxe, whose
natural granddaughter she is.
The decisive character and romantic daring of the famous Watteville
had reappeared in the soul of his grand-niece, reinforced by the
tenacity and pride of blood of the Rupts. But these qualities--or
Albert Savarus |
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 Koran: of every noble kind? verily, in that is a sign; but most of them
will never be believers! but, verily, thy Lord He is mighty and
merciful.
And when thy Lord called Moses (saying), 'Come to the unjust people,
to the people of Pharaoh, will they not fear?' Said he, 'My Lord!
verily, I fear that they will call me liar; and my breast is
straitened, and my tongue is not fluent; send then unto Aaron, for
they have a crime against me, and I fear that they may kill me.'
Said He, 'Not so; but go with our signs, verily, we are with you
listening.
'And go to Pharaoh and say, "Verily, we are the apostles of the Lord
The Koran |
