| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Scarecrow of Oz by L. Frank Baum: was so kind and considerate and he was so obliging and
honest, that all who knew him loved him, and there were
few people in Oz who had not met our Scarecrow and made
his acquaintance. He lived part of the time in Ozma's
palace at the Emerald City, part of the time in his own
corncob castle in the Winkie Country, and part of the
time he traveled over all Oz, visiting with the people
and playing with the children, whom he dearly loved.
It was on one of his wandering journeys that the
Scarecrow had arrived at Glinda's palace, and the
Sorceress at once made him welcome. As he sat beside her,
The Scarecrow of Oz |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Ancient Regime by Charles Kingsley: free, in the dawning future.
It will be seen, from what I have said, that I consider the Ancien
Regime to begin in the seventeenth century. I should date its
commencement--as far as that of anything so vague, unsystematic,
indeed anarchic, can be defined--from the end of the Thirty Years'
War, and the peace of Westphalia in 1648.
For by that time the mighty spiritual struggles and fierce religious
animosities of the preceding century had worn themselves out. And,
as always happens, to a period of earnest excitement had succeeded
one of weariness, disgust, half-unbelief in the many questions for
which so much blood had been shed. No man had come out of the
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