| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Wyoming by William MacLeod Raine: How she hated her task, and him! She was a singularly honest
woman, but she must play the siren; must allure this scoundrel to
forgetfulness, with a hurried and yet elude the very familiarity
her manner invited. She knew her part, the heartless enticing
coquette, compounded half of passion and half of selfishness. It
was a hateful thing to do, this sacrifice of her personal
reticence, of the individual abstraction in which she wrapped
herself as a cloak, in order to hint at a possibility of some
intimacy of feeling between them. She shrank from it with a
repugnance hardly to be overcome, but she held herself with an
iron will and consummate art to the role she had undertaken. Two
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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 Faith of Men by Jack London: other. That was the last of the canoe, and he came on into
Sunrise. Yes, from the way the Indian in the canoe jumped, he was
sure he had potted him. That was all. This explanation was not
deemed adequate. They gave him ten hours' grace while the Lizzie
steamed down to investigate. Ten hours later she came wheezing
back to Sunrise. There had been nothing to investigate. No
evidence had been found to back up his statements. They told him
to make his will, for he possessed a fifty-thousand dollar Sunrise
claim, and they were a law-abiding as well as a law-giving breed.
Leclere shrugged his shoulders. "Bot one t'ing," he said; "a
leetle, w'at you call, favour--a leetle favour, dat is eet. I gif
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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 King James Bible: him, Thus saith the king, Come forth. And he said, Nay; but I will die
here. And Benaiah brought the king word again, saying, Thus said Joab,
and thus he answered me.
KI1 2:31 And the king said unto him, Do as he hath said, and fall upon
him, and bury him; that thou mayest take away the innocent blood, which
Joab shed, from me, and from the house of my father.
KI1 2:32 And the LORD shall return his blood upon his own head, who
fell upon two men more righteous and better than he, and slew them with
the sword, my father David not knowing thereof, to wit, Abner the son of
Ner, captain of the host of Israel, and Amasa the son of Jether, captain
of the host of Judah.
King James Bible |
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 Heart of the West by O. Henry: on Miss Learight a few times; but not for the purpose you imagine. My
object is purely a gastronomical one.'
"I reached for my gun.
"'Any coyote,' says I, 'that would boast of dishonourable--'
"'Wait a minute,' says this Bird, 'till I explain. What would I do
with a wife? If you ever saw that ranch of mine! I do my own cooking
and mending. Eating--that's all the pleasure I get out of sheep
raising. Mr. Judson, did you ever taste the pancakes that Miss
Learight makes?'
"'Me? No,' I told him. 'I never was advised that she was up to any
culinary manoeuvres.'
Heart of the West |
