| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Reef by Edith Wharton: say so too."
"No, no: we must neither of us have any reason for saying it
again." She looked at him gravely. "Surely you and I
needn't arrange the lights before we show ourselves to each
other. I want you to see me just as I am, with all my
irrational doubts and scruples; the old ones and the new
ones too."
He came back to his seat beside her. "Never mind the old
ones. They were justified--I'm willing to admit it. With
the governess having suddenly to be packed off, and Effie on
your hands, and your mother-in-law ill, I see the
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Menexenus by Plato: tendency may also be observed to blend the works and opinions of the master
with those of his scholars. To a later Platonist, the difference between
Plato and his imitators was not so perceptible as to ourselves. The
Memorabilia of Xenophon and the Dialogues of Plato are but a part of a
considerable Socratic literature which has passed away. And we must
consider how we should regard the question of the genuineness of a
particular writing, if this lost literature had been preserved to us.
These considerations lead us to adopt the following criteria of
genuineness: (1) That is most certainly Plato's which Aristotle attributes
to him by name, which (2) is of considerable length, of (3) great
excellence, and also (4) in harmony with the general spirit of the Platonic
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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 A Sentimental Journey by Laurence Sterne: of pairs myself.
THE GLOVES. PARIS.
THE beautiful grisette rose up when I said this, and going behind
the counter, reach'd down a parcel and untied it: I advanced to the
side over against her: they were all too large. The beautiful
grisette measured them one by one across my hand. - It would not
alter their dimensions. - She begg'd I would try a single pair,
which seemed to be the least. - She held it open; - my hand slipped
into it at once. - It will not do, said I, shaking my head a
little. - No, said she, doing the same thing.
There are certain combined looks of simple subtlety, - where whim,
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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 Another Study of Woman by Honore de Balzac: shop still having faith in pleasure, but where love was concerned I
was as atheistical as a mathematician.
"Two months later I was sitting by the side of the ethereal being in
her boudoir, on her sofa; I was holding one of her hands--they were
very beautiful--and we scaled the Alps of sentiment, culling their
sweetest flowers, and pulling off the daisy-petals; there is always a
moment when one pulls daisies to pieces, even if it is in a drawing-
room and there are no daisies. At the intensest moment of tenderness,
and when we are most in love, love is so well aware of its own short
duration that we are irresistibly urged to ask, 'Do you love me? Will
you love me always?' I seized the elegiac moment, so warm, so flowery,
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