| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from My Aunt Margaret's Mirror by Walter Scott: maidservants call it, too vehemently, and by showing before every
stranger, by manner, and sometimes by words also, a
dissatisfaction with her husband's journey that was sure to come
to his ears, and equally certain to displease him. But there was
no help for this domestic dissension, which ended only with the
day of separation.
I am sorry I cannot tell, with precision, the year in which Sir
Philip Forester went over to Flanders; but it was one of those in
which the campaign opened with extraordinary fury, and many
bloody, though indecisive, skirmishes were fought between the
French on the one side and the Allies on the other. In all our
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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 Gentle Grafter by O. Henry: never allowed to swindle sick old women and working girls and take
nickels off of kids. In the lines of graft we've worked we took money
from the people the Lord made to be buncoed--sports and rounders and
smart Alecks and street crowds, that always have a few dollars to
throw away, and farmers that wouldn't ever be happy if the grafters
didn't come around and play with 'em when they sold their crops. We
never cared to fish for the kind of suckers that bite here. No, sir.
We got too much respect for the profession and for ourselves. Good-by
to you, Mr. Receiver."
"Here!" says the journalist reporter; "wait a minute. There's a broker
I know on the next floor. Wait till I put this truck in his safe. I
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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 Story of an African Farm by Olive Schreiner: that I am a woman and you are a man; I only know that we are both things
that think. Other men when I am with them, whether I love them or not,
they are mere bodies to me; but you are a spirit; I like you. Look," she
said quickly, sinking back into her corner, "what a pretty pinkness there
is on all the hilltops! The sun will rise in a moment."
Waldo lifted his eyes to look round over the circle of golden hills; and
the horses, as the first sunbeams touched them, shook their heads and
champed their bright bits, till the brass settings in their harness
glittered again.
It was eight o'clock when they neared the farmhouse: a red-brick building,
with kraals to the right and a small orchard to the left. Already there
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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 Moll Flanders by Daniel Defoe: I got softly out, fastened the door again, and gave my gentleman
and the coach the slip both together, and never heard more
of them.
This was an adventure indeed unlooked for, and perfectly
undesigned by me; though I was not so past the merry part
of life, as to forget how to behave, when a fop so blinded by
his appetite should not know an old woman from a young. I
did not indeed look so old as I was by ten or twelve years; yet
I was not a young wench of seventeen, and it was easy enough
to be distinguished. There is nothing so absurd, so surfeiting,
so ridiculous, as a man heated by wine in his head, and wicked
Moll Flanders |
