| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Lucile by Owen Meredith: The mild, multitudinous lights lay asleep,
Pastured free on the midnight, and bright as the sheep
Of Apollo in pastoral Thrace; from unknown
Hollow glooms freshen'd odors around them were blown
Intermittingly; then the moon dropp'd from their sight,
Immersed in the mountains, and put out the light
Which no longer they needed to read on the face
Of each other life's last revelation.
The place
Slept sumptuous round them; and Nature, that never
Sleeps, but waking reposes, with patient endeavor
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Start in Life by Honore de Balzac: forty thousand francs which Leger offered him to bring about the
transaction.
"I tell you what," said the steward to his wife, as he went to bed
that night, "if I make fifty thousand francs out of the Moulineaux
affair,--and I certainly shall, for the count will give me ten
thousand as a fee,--we'll retire to Isle-Adam and live in the Pavillon
de Nogent."
This "pavillon" was a charming place, originally built by the Prince
de Conti for a mistress, and in it every convenience and luxury had
been placed.
"That will suit me," said his wife. "The Dutchman who lives there has
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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 Fisherman's Luck by Henry van Dyke: night in a waterproof cloak, holding an umbrella. The next day they
were back at the hotel in time for lunch.
"It was horrid," she told her most intimate friend, "perfectly
horrid. The idea of sleeping in a shower-bath, and eating your
breakfast from a tin plate, just for sake of catching a few silly
fish! Why not send your guides out to get them for you?"
But, in spite of this profession of obstinate heresy, Beekman
observed with secret joy that there were signs, before the end of
the season, that Cornelia was drifting a little, a very little but
still perceptibly, in the direction of a change of heart. She began
to take an interest, as the big trout came along in September, in
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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 Enemies of Books by William Blades: Spring clean, horrors of, 133.
Stark (Mr.), bookseller, 55-58.
Stealing a Caxton, 54.
Steam press, 40.
Strasbourg, siege of, 13.
Sun-light of gas, 29, 32.
Sun worship, 5.
Sylvester's Laws of Verse, 71.
Taylor, the water-poet, 121.
Teylerian Museum, Haarlem, 128.
Theurdanck, prints in, 125.
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