| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Snow Image by Nathaniel Hawthorne: picture of the hut, the spring beside its door, the athletic and
coal-begrimed figure of the lime-burner, and the half-frightened
child, shrinking into the protection of his father's shadow. And
when, again, the iron door was closed, then reappeared the tender
light of the half-full moon, which vainly strove to trace out the
indistinct shapes of the neighboring mountains; and, in the upper
sky, there was a flitting congregation of clouds, still faintly
tinged with the rosy sunset, though thus far down into the valley
the sunshine had vanished long and long ago
The little boy now crept still closer to his father, as footsteps
were heard ascending the hill-side, and a human form thrust aside
The Snow Image |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Eve and David by Honore de Balzac: and begged him not to ruin David with needless costs. Metivier
received the heroic letter, and shammed dead. His head-clerk replied
that in the absence of M. Metivier he could not take it upon himself
to stay proceedings, for his employer had made it a rule to let the
law take its course. Eve wrote again, offering this time to renew the
bills and pay all the costs hitherto incurred. To this the clerk
consented, provided that Sechard senior guaranteed payment. So Eve
walked over to Marsac, taking Kolb and her mother with her. She braved
the old vinedresser, and so charming was she, that the old man's face
relaxed, and the puckers smoothed out at the sight of her; but when,
with inward quakings, she came to speak of a guarantee, she beheld a
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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 Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen: Meryton greatly in debt; but I hope this may be false."
"Oh, Jane, had we been less secret, had we told what we knew
of him, this could not have happened!"
"Perhaps it would have been better," replied her sister. "But to
expose the former faults of any person without knowing what
their present feelings were, seemed unjustifiable. We acted with
the best intentions."
"Could Colonel Forster repeat the particulars of Lydia's note to
his wife?"
"He brought it with him for us to see."
Jane then took it from her pocket-book, and gave it to Elizabeth.
Pride and Prejudice |
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 Red Inn by Honore de Balzac: Those praises are so many dagger-thrusts with which she stabs me to
the heart.
One day I came near making myself the accomplice, as it were, of the
crime which led to the opulence of the Taillefer family. I was on the
point of asking the father for Victorine's hand. But I fled; I
travelled; I went to Germany, to Andernach; and then--I returned! I
found Victorine pale, and thinner; if I had seen her well in health
and gay, I should certainly have been saved. Instead of which my love
burst out again with untold violence. Fearing that my scruples might
degenerate into monomania, I resolved to convoke a sanhedrim of sound
consciences, and obtain from them some light on this problem of high
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