| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Lady Baltimore by Owen Wister: knowledge, though small in amount.
If the health of John Mayrant's mother, I learned, had allowed that lady
to bring him up Herself, many follies might have been saved the youth.
His aunt, Miss Eliza St. Michael, though a pattern of good intentions,
was not always a pattern of wisdom. Moreover, how should a spinster bring
up a boy fitly?
Of the Rieppes, father and daughter, I also learned a little more. They
did not (most people believed) come from Georgia. Natchez and Mobile
seemed to divide the responsibility of giving them to the world. It was
quite certain the General had run away from Chattanooga. Nobody disputed
this, or offered any other battle as the authentic one. Of late 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 Yates Pride by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman: if it hadn't been for --"
The man stopped, and his face was pink. Eudora turned her face
slightly away.
"By the way," said the man, in a suddenly hushed voice, "I
suppose the kid you've got there is asleep. Wouldn't do to wake
him?"
"I think I had better not," replied Eudora, in a hesitating
voice. She began to walk along, and Harry Lawton fell into step
beside her.
"I suppose it isn't best to wake up babies; makes them cross, and
they cry," he said. "Say, Eudora, is he much trouble?"
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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 Dust by Mr. And Mrs. Haldeman-Julius: of the thin neck stood out. Chaotically, he compared her to the
happy young girl--round of cheek and laughing of eye--he had
married back in Ohio, fifteen years before. It comforted him a
little to remember he hadn't done so badly by her until the war
had torn him from his rented farm and she had been forced to do a
man's work in field and barn. Exposure and a lung wound from a
rebel bullet had sent Wade home an invalid, and during the five
years which had followed, he had realized only too well how
little help he had been to her.
It is not likely he would have had the iron persistency of
purpose to drag her through this new stern trial if he had not
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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 King Lear by William Shakespeare: and fond bondage in the oppression of aged tyranny, who
sways,
not as it hath power, but as it is suffer'd. Come to me,
that
of this I may speak more. If our father would sleep till I
wak'd him, you should enjoy half his revenue for ever, and
live
the beloved of your brother,
'EDGAR.'
Hum! Conspiracy? 'Sleep till I wak'd him, you should enjoy
half
King Lear |
