| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Start in Life by Honore de Balzac: uncle Cardot."
"Yes, mamma."
"Above all," she said, in a low voice, "be sure never to speak about
servants; keep thinking all the time that Madame Moreau was once a
waiting-maid."
"Yes, mamma."
Oscar, like all youths whose vanity is excessively ticklish, seemed
annoyed at being lectured on the threshold of the Lion d'Argent.
"Well, now good-bye, mamma. We shall start soon; there's the horse all
harnessed."
The mother, forgetting that she was in the open street, embraced her
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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 Water-Babies by Charles Kingsley: into the river, or calling you a poaching snob.
Then Tom went on down, for he was afraid of staying near Grimes:
and as he went, all the vale looked sad. The red and yellow leaves
showered down into the river; the flies and beetles were all dead
and gone; the chill autumn fog lay low upon the hills, and
sometimes spread itself so thickly on the river that he could not
see his way. But he felt his way instead, following the flow of
the stream, day after day, past great bridges, past boats and
barges, past the great town, with its wharfs, and mills, and tall
smoking chimneys, and ships which rode at anchor in the stream; and
now and then he ran against their hawsers, and wondered what they
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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 Market-Place by Harold Frederic: and bosom. He marvelled at himself for discovering only
now that she also was beautiful--and then thrilled with
pride at the thought that henceforth his life might be
passed altogether among beautiful women, radiant in gems
and costly fabrics, who would smile upon him at his command.
"Oh, I have no wish to be a kill-joy," she protested.
"I'm sure I hope all manner of good results from the--
the experiment."
"I suppose that's what it comes to," he said, meditatively.
"It's all an experiment. Every marriage in the world
must be that--neither more nor less."
The Market-Place |
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 Glaucus/The Wonders of the Shore by Charles Kingsley: the air in large towns, by planting trees and cultivating flowers
in rooms, THAT THE ANIMAL AND VEGETABLE RESPIRATIONS MIGHT
COUNTERBALANCE EACH OTHER; the animal's blood being purified by the
oxygen given off by the plants, the plants fed by the carbonic acid
breathed out by the animals.
On the same principle, Mr. Warrington first kept, for many months,
in a vase of unchanged water, two small gold fish and a plant of
Vallisneria spiralis; and two years afterwards began a similar
experiment with sea-water, weeds, and anemones, which were, at
last, as successful as the former ones. Mr. Gosse had, in the
meanwhile, with tolerable success begun a similar method, unaware
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