| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A House of Pomegranates by Oscar Wilde: the other wall. Between the windows stood a black ebony cabinet,
inlaid with plates of ivory, on which the figures from Holbein's
Dance of Death had been graved - by the hand, some said, of that
famous master himself.
But the little Dwarf cared nothing for all this magnificence. He
would not have given his rose for all the pearls on the canopy, nor
one white petal of his rose for the throne itself. What he wanted
was to see the Infanta before she went down to the pavilion, and to
ask her to come away with him when he had finished his dance.
Here, in the Palace, the air was close and heavy, but in the forest
the wind blew free, and the sunlight with wandering hands of gold
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians by Martin Luther: In direct opposition to the scholastics Paul declares: "The law is not of
faith." What is this charity the scholastics talk so much about? Does not
the Law command charity? The fact is the Law commands nothing but
charity, as we may gather from the following Scripture passages: "Thou
shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and
with all thy might" (Deut. 6:5.) "Strewing mercy unto thousands of them
that love me, and keep my commandments." (Exodus 20:6.) "On these
two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." (Matt. 22:40.) If
the law requires charity, charity is part of the Law and not of faith. Since
Christ has displaced the Law which commands charity, it follows that
charity has been abrogated with the Law as a factor in our justification, and
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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 A Drama on the Seashore by Honore de Balzac: of everything. During one of his father's fishing-trips Jacques
carried off all she had, furniture, pots and pans, sheets, linen,
everything; he sold it to go to Nantes and carry on his capers there.
The poor mother wept day and night. This time it couldn't be hidden
from the father, and she feared him--not for herself, you may be sure
of that. When Pierre Cambremer came back and saw furniture in his
house which the neighbors had lent to his wife, he said,--
"'What is all this?'
"The poor woman, more dead than alive, replied:
"'We have been robbed.'
"'Where is Jacques?'
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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 Paz by Honore de Balzac: was the best sort of man a circus-rider had ever encountered, not
fault-finding nor jealous, and willing to let Malaga do just what she
liked.
"Some women have the luck of it," said Malaga's rival, "and I'm not
one of them,--though I do draw a third of the receipts."
Malaga wore pretty things, and occasionally "showed her head" (a term
in the lexicon of such characters) in the Bois, where the fashionable
young men of the day began to remark her. In fact, before long Malaga
was very much talked about in the questionable world of equivocal
women, who presently attacked her good fortune by calumnies. They said
she was a somnambulist, and the Pole was a magnetizer who was using
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