| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas: salmon; but it seemed impossible to procure it, and here it
is."
"But how could you have these fish brought to France?"
"Oh, nothing more easy. Each fish was brought over in a cask
-- one filled with river herbs and weeds, the other with
rushes and lake plants; they were placed in a wagon built on
purpose, and thus the sterlet lived twelve days, the lamprey
eight, and both were alive when my cook seized them, killing
one with milk and the other with wine. You do not believe
me, M. Danglars!"
"I cannot help doubting," answered Danglars with his stupid
The Count of Monte Cristo |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Heart of the West by O. Henry: the door, and squeezes me 'most to death. And there you was, sir,
a-lyin' there jest like you was dead, and I 'lowed we'd see what might
be done to help sot you up."
"I think I'll sit up now," said the concussion patient. "I'm feeling
pretty fair by this time."
He sat, somewhat weakly yet, leaning against the wall. He was a rugged
man, big-boned and straight. His eyes, steady and keen, seemed to
linger upon the face of the man standing so still above him. His look
wandered often from the face he studied to the marshal's badge upon
the other's breast.
"Yes, yes, you'll be all right," said the old woman, patting his arm,
Heart of the West |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis: chairs and so on and so forth. Or I could--"
"Now you look here! The first thing you got to understand is that all this
uplift and flipflop and settlement-work and recreation is nothing in God's
world but the entering wedge for socialism. The sooner a man learns he isn't
going to be coddled, and he needn't expect a lot of free grub and, uh, all
these free classes and flipflop and doodads for his kids unless he earns 'em,
why, the sooner he'll get on the job and produce--produce--produce! That's
what the country needs, and not all this fancy stuff that just enfeebles the
will-power of the working man and gives his kids a lot of notions above their
class. And you--if you'd tend to business instead of fooling and fussing--All
the time! When I was a young man I made up my mind what I wanted to do, and
|
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 Figure in the Carpet by Henry James: present to my fancy as those of a chessplayer bent with a silent
scowl, all the lamplit winter, over his board and his moves. As my
imagination filled it out the picture held me fast. On the other
side of the table was a ghostlier form, the faint figure of an
antagonist good-humouredly but a little wearily secure - an
antagonist who leaned back in his chair with his hands in his
pockets and a smile on his fine clear face. Close to Corvick,
behind him, was a girl who had begun to strike me as pale and
wasted and even, on more familiar view, as rather handsome, and who
rested on his shoulder and hung on his moves. He would take up a
chessman and hold it poised a while over one of the little squares,
|
