| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Heritage of the Desert by Zane Grey: thicket of boughs; he whistled; he wheeled with his shiny hoofs lifting.
In an hour the Indian was edging the outer circle of the corral, with the
stallion pivoting in the centre, ears laid back, eyes shooting sparks,
fight in every line of him. And the circle narrowed inward.
Suddenly the Navajo sent the roan at Silvermane and threw his halter. It
spread out like a lasso, and the loop went over the head of the stallion,
slipped to the knot and held fast, while the rope tightened. Silvermane
leaped up, forehoofs pawing the air, and his long shrill cry was neither
whistle, snort, nor screech, but all combined. He came down, missing
Charger with his hoofs, sliding off his haunches. The Indian, his bronze
muscles rippling, close-hauled on the rope, making half hitches round his
The Heritage of the Desert |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Father Damien by Robert Louis Stevenson: of that which should have been conceived and was not; of the
service due and not rendered. TIME WAS, said the voice in your
ear, in your pleasant room, as you sat raging and writing; and if
the words written were base beyond parallel, the rage, I am happy
to repeat - it is the only compliment I shall pay you - the rage
was almost virtuous. But, sir, when we have failed, and another
has succeeded; when we have stood by, and another has stepped in;
when we sit and grow bulky in our charming mansions, and a plain,
uncouth peasant steps into the battle, under the eyes of God, and
succours the afflicted, and consoles the dying, and is himself
afflicted in his turn, and dies upon the field of honour - the
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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 The Three Taverns by Edwin Arlington Robinson: If you should only steal an hour to think,
Sometime, there might be less to be forgiven.
"No, you are never cruel. If once or twice
I found you so, I could applaud and sing.
Jealous of -- What? You are not very wise.
Does not the good Book tell you anything?
"In David's time poor Michal had to go.
Jealous of God? Well, if you like it so."
The Old King's New Jester
You that in vain would front the coming order
With eyes that meet forlornly what they must,
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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 The Glimpses of the Moon by Edith Wharton: then she came slowly back to the chair. There, at her elbow,
lay the four fatal envelopes; and her next affair was to make up
her mind what to do with them.
To destroy them on the spot had seemed, at first thought,
inevitable: it might be saving Ellie as well as herself. But
such a step seemed to Susy to involve departure on the morrow,
and this in turn involved notifying Ellie, whose letter she had
vainly scanned for an address. Well--perhaps Clarissa's nurse
would know where one could write to her mother; it was unlikely
that even Ellie would go off without assuring some means of
communication with her child. At any rate, there was nothing to
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