| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen: bodies, in a variety of capers and frisks, was the first pleasing
earnest of their welcome.
Elizabeth jumped out; and, after giving each of them a hasty
kiss, hurried into the vestibule, where Jane, who came running
down from her mother's apartment, immediately met her.
Elizabeth, as she affectionately embraced her, whilst tears filled
the eyes of both, lost not a moment in asking whether anything
had been heard of the fugitives.
"Not yet," replied Jane. "But now that my dear uncle is come, I
hope everything will be well."
"Is my father in town?"
Pride and Prejudice |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Democracy In America, Volume 2 by Alexis de Toqueville: rigorously obeyed. The position of a caste is always much more
peculiar than that of a people. Nothing is so much out of the
way of the world as a small community invariably composed of the
same families (as was for instance the aristocracy of the Middle
Ages), whose object is to concentrate and to retain, exclusively
and hereditarily, education, wealth, and power amongst its own
members. But the more out of the way the position of a community
happens to be, the more numerous are its special wants, and the
more extensive are its notions of honor corresponding to those
wants. The rules of honor will therefore always be less numerous
amongst a people not divided into castes than amongst any other.
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie: "She still had the letter, or whatever it was, in her hand?"
"Yes, sir."
"What would she be likely to do with it afterwards?"
"Well, I don't know, sir, I expect she would lock it up in that
purple case of hers."
"Is that where she usually kept important papers?"
"Yes, sir. She brought it down with her every morning, and took
it up every night."
"When did she lose the key of it?"
"She missed it yesterday at lunch-time, sir, and told me to look
carefully for it. She was very much put out about it."
The Mysterious Affair at Styles |
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 Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton by Edith Wharton: The fact threw her into deeper perplexity, since, now that he had
done with "business" and its disturbing contingencies, the one
other possible element of anxiety was eliminated. Unless it were
his health, then? But physically he had gained since they had
come to Dorsetshire, grown robuster, ruddier, and fresher-eyed.
It was only within a week that she had felt in him the
undefinable change that made her restless in his absence, and as
tongue-tied in his presence as though it were SHE who had a
secret to keep from him!
The thought that there WAS a secret somewhere between them struck
her with a sudden smart rap of wonder, and she looked about her
|
