| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad: matronly air of gracious resolution; a clean-shaved individual with
sunken cheeks, and dangling a gold-mounted eyeglass on a broad
black ribbon with an old-world, dandified effect. A silence
deferential, but full of reserves, reigned for a moment, and then
the great lady exclaimed, not with resentment, but with a sort of
protesting indignation:
"And that officially is supposed to be a revolutionist! What
nonsense." She looked hard at the Assistant Commissioner, who
murmured apologetically:
"Not a dangerous one perhaps."
"Not dangerous - I should think not indeed. He is a mere believer.
The Secret Agent |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Ruling Passion by Henry van Dyke: me many things--about the nicoline, I think she calls him; how he
goes into the blood and into the bones and into the hair, and how
quickly he will kill the cat. And she says, very strong, 'The men
who smoke the tobacco shall die!'"
"That must have frightened you well, Pat. I suppose you threw away
your pipe at once."
"But no, m'sieu'; this time I continue to smoke, for now it is Mees
Meelair who comes near the pipe voluntarily, and it is not my
offence. And I remember, while she is talking, the old bonhomme
Michaud St. Gerome. He is a capable man; when he was young he could
carry a barrel of flour a mile without rest, and now that he has
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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 Yates Pride by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman: heard a short time ago that you were here," she said, in her
usual even voice. The fair oval of her face was as serene and
proud toward the man as the face of the moon.
The man swung his umbrella, then began prodding the ground with
it. "Hullo, Eudora," he said again; then he added: "How are you,
anyway? Fine and well?"
"I am very well, thank you," said Eudora. "So you have come home
to Wellwood after all this time?"
The man made an effort and recovered himself, although his
handsome face was burning.
"Yes," he remarked, with considerable ease and dignity, to which
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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 The Jolly Corner by Henry James: represented, and with the selfsame throb, the strangest, the most
joyous, possibly the next minute almost the proudest, duplication
of consciousness.
"He has been dodging, retreating, hiding, but now, worked up to
anger, he'll fight!" - this intense impression made a single
mouthful, as it were, of terror and applause. But what was
wondrous was that the applause, for the felt fact, was so eager,
since, if it was his other self he was running to earth, this
ineffable identity was thus in the last resort not unworthy of him.
It bristled there - somewhere near at hand, however unseen still -
as the hunted thing, even as the trodden worm of the adage must at
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