| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Westward Ho! by Charles Kingsley: "Do you mean to cast any slur, sir, upon the courage and conduct of
his Catholic majesty's soldiers?" asked the colonel.
"I?--No; but we were foully beaten, and that behind our barricades
too, and there's the plain truth."
"Beaten, sir! Do you apply such a term to the fortunes of war?
What more could our governor have done? Had we not the ways filled
with poisoned caltrops, guarded by Indian archers, barred with
butts full of earth, raked with culverins and arquebuses? What
familiar spirit had we, sir, to tell us that these villains would
come along the sea-beach, and not by the high-road, like Christian
men?"
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from An Unsocial Socialist by George Bernard Shaw: fortune, but he was not a social democrat; he was a clerk who had
embezzled, and who applied to me for assistance under the
impression that I considered it rather meritorious to rob the
till of a capitalist."
"He was a practical Socialist, in fact," said Erskine.
"On the contrary, he was a somewhat too grasping Individualist.
Howbeit, I enabled him to make good his defalcation--in the city
they consider a defalcation made good when the money is
replaced--and to go to New York. I recommended him not to go
there; but he knew better than I, for he made a fortune by
speculating with money that existed only in the imagination of
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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 Merry Men by Robert Louis Stevenson: ran to him, even dropping the compass in their hurry, and I could
see the bone and the shoe-buckle going from hand to hand, causing
the most unusual gesticulations of surprise and interest. Just
then I could hear the seamen crying from the boat, and saw them
point westward to that cloud continent which was ever the more
rapidly unfurling its blackness over heaven. The others seemed to
consult; but the danger was too pressing to be braved, and they
bundled into the boat carrying my relies with them, and set forth
out of the bay with all speed of oars.
I made no more ado about the matter, but turned and ran for the
house. Whoever these men were, it was fit my uncle should be
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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 Hiero by Xenophon: the proportions of what has taken place, as far as may be. He will
apologise for what he does, even in the doing of it, letting it appear
that what he has wrought at least was innocent;[20] so little does his
conduct seem noble even to himself. And when those he dreaded are
safely in their graves, he is not one whit more confident of spirit,
but still more on his guard than heretofore. That is the kind of war
with which the tyrant is beset from day to day continually, as I do
prove.[21]
[17] See Hold. (crit. app.); Hartman, op. cit. p. 260.
[18] Cf. "Mem." I. ii. 38.
[19] Cf. "Anab." II. vi. 11; "Hell." VI. iv. 16.
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