| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Black Arrow by Robert Louis Stevenson: torches; but gradually he strolled further afield, and at length
passed clean beyond the outposts, and walked alone in the frozen
forest, waiting for the sun.
His thoughts were both quiet and happy. His brief favour with the
Duke he could not find it in his heart to mourn; with Joan to wife,
and my Lord Foxham for a faithful patron, he looked most happily
upon the future; and in the past he found but little to regret.
As he thus strolled and pondered, the solemn light of the morning
grew more clear, the east was already coloured by the sun, and a
little scathing wind blew up the frozen snow. He turned to go
home; but even as he turned, his eye lit upon a figure behind, a
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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 Man of Business by Honore de Balzac: the young lady some few days after Cerizet's visit to Maxime. 'I hold
my relations in horror. They are peasants born to work in the fields.
Just imagine it, I came up from the country with six francs in my
pocket, and made my fortune here. I am not proud. A pretty woman is my
equal. Now would it not be nicer to be Mme. Croizeau for some years to
come than to do a Count's pleasure for a twelvemonth? He will go off
and leave you some time or other; and when that day comes, you will
think of me . . . your servant, my pretty lady!'
"All this was simmering below the surface. The slightest approach at
love-making was made quite on the sly. Not a soul suspected that the
trim little old fogy was smitten with Antonia; and so prudent was the
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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 The Wife, et al by Anton Chekhov: began on his story, and it seemed as though not only Burkin and
Alehin were listening, but also the ladies, young and old, and
the officers who looked down upon them sternly and calmly from
their gold frames.
"There are two of us brothers," he began --"I, Ivan Ivanovitch,
and my brother, Nikolay Ivanovitch, two years younger. I went in
for a learned profession and became a veterinary surgeon, while
Nikolay sat in a government office from the time he was nineteen.
Our father, Tchimsha-Himalaisky, was a kantonist, but he rose to
be an officer and left us a little estate and the rank of
nobility. After his death the little estate went in debts and
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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 Sanitary and Social Lectures by Charles Kingsley: trustfully, joyfully, earnestly; for it is thy heritage. Behold
its perfect fitness for thy life here; and judge from thence its
fitness for thy nobler life hereafter.
HEROISM
It is an open question whether the policeman is not demoralising
us; and that in proportion as he does his duty well; whether the
perfection of justice and safety, the complete "preservation of
body and goods," may not reduce the educated and comfortable
classes into that lap-dog condition in which not conscience, but
comfort, doth make cowards of us all. Our forefathers had, on the
whole, to take care of themselves; we find it more convenient to
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