| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Memories and Portraits by Robert Louis Stevenson: back, I can discern that, in part, we loved the thing he was, for
some shadow of what he was to be. For with all his beauty, power,
breeding, urbanity and mirth, there was in those days something
soulless in our friend. He would astonish us by sallies, witty,
innocent and inhumane; and by a misapplied Johnsonian pleasantry,
demolish honest sentiment. I can still see and hear him, as he
went his way along the lamplit streets, LA CI DAREM LA MANO on his
lips, a noble figure of a youth, but following vanity and
incredulous of good; and sure enough, somewhere on the high seas of
life, with his health, his hopes, his patrimony and his self-
respect, miserably went down.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Oscar Wilde Miscellaneous by Oscar Wilde: Narrowed into the confines of this room
With but three souls for poor inhabitants?
Ay! there are times when the great universe,
Like cloth in some unskilful dyer's vat,
Shrivels into a handbreadth, and perchance
That time is now! Well! let that time be now.
Let this mean room be as that mighty stage
Whereon kings die, and our ignoble lives
Become the stakes God plays for.
I do not know
Why I speak thus. My ride has wearied me.
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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 Russia in 1919 by Arthur Ransome: put your coat on."
That meant arrest, and the nephew said he had five
thousand roubles and would pay that, but could pay no
more. Would that do?
"Very well," said the tax-collector, "fetch it."
The nephew fetched it.
"And now put your coat on."
"But you said it would be all right if I paid the five
thousand!"
"That's the only way to deal with people like you. We
recognize that your case is hard, and we dare say that you
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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 Beauty and The Beast by Bayard Taylor: said. He had been thrown from his horse, probably alighting upon
his head, as there were neither fractures nor external wounds. All
that night and next day the tenderest, the most unwearied care was
exerted to call back the flickering gleam of life. The shock had
been too great; his deadly torpor deepened into death.
In their time of trial and sorrow the family received the fullest
sympathy, the kindliest help, from the whole neighborhood. They
had never before so fully appreciated the fraternal character
of the society whereof they were members. The plain, plodding
people living on the adjoining farms became virtually their
relatives and fellow-mourners. All the external offices demanded
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