| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Middlemarch by George Eliot: but to carry it. You go against rottenness, and there is nothing
more thoroughly rotten than making people believe that society can
be cured by a political hocus-pocus."
"That's very fine, my dear fellow. But your cure must begin somewhere,
and put it that a thousand things which debase a population can
never be reformed without this particular reform to begin with.
Look what Stanley said the other day--that the House had been
tinkering long enough at small questions of bribery, inquiring whether
this or that voter has had a guinea when everybody knows that the
seats have been sold wholesale. Wait for wisdom and conscience
in public agents--fiddlestick! The only conscience we can trust
 Middlemarch |
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 A Princess of Parms by Edgar Rice Burroughs: The flagship bore down upon us, and as she swung gracefully
to and touched our side a dozen officers sprang upon
our decks. As their astonished gaze fell upon the hundreds
of green warriors, who now came forth from the fighting
shelters, they stopped aghast, but at sight of Kantos Kan,
who advanced to meet them, they came forward, crowding
about him.
Dejah Thoris and I then advanced, and they had no eyes
for other than her. She received them gracefully, calling
each by name, for they were men high in the esteem and
service of her grandfather, and she knew them well.
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