| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Bickerstaff-Partridge Papers by Jonathan Swift: than I did myself. I told him his discourse surprized me; and I
would be glad he were in a state of health to be able to tell me
what reason he had to be convinc'd of Mr. Bickerstaff's
ignorance. He reply'd, I am a poor ignorant fellow, bred to a
mean trade, yet I have sense enough to know that all pretences of
foretelling by astrology are deceits, for this manifest reason,
because the wise and the learned, who can only know whether there
be any truth in this science, do all unanimously agree to laugh
at and despise it; and none but the poor ignorant vulgar give it
any credit, and that only upon the word of such silly wretches as
I and my fellows, who can hardly write or read. I then asked him
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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 Amazing Interlude by Mary Roberts Rinehart: questioned him. Hate all Germans as they must, who had suffered so
grossly, this boy was not of those who had outraged them.
They sent him on at last, and Sara Lee was free to tell Henri her news.
But she had grown very wise as to Henri's moods, and she hesitated. A
certain dissatisfaction had been growing in the boy for some time, a
sense of hopelessness. Further along the spring had brought renewed
activity to the Allied armies. Great movements were taking place.
But his own men stood in their trenches, or what passed for trenches, or
lay on their hours of relief in such wretched quarters as could be found,
still with no prospect of action. No great guns, drawn by heavy
tractors, came down the roads toward the trenches by the sea. Steady
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