| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Confidence by Henry James: Gordon Wright, in spite of Bernard's interrogative glances,
indulged in no optical confidences. He had too much to tell.
He would keep his story till they should be alone together.
It was impossible that they should adjourn just yet to
social solitude; the two ladies were under Gordon's protection.
Mrs. Vivian--Bernard felt a satisfaction in learning her name;
it was as if a curtain, half pulled up and stopped by a hitch,
had suddenly been raised altogether--Mrs. Vivian sat looking
up and down the terrace at the crowd of loungers and talkers
with an air of tender expectation. She was probably looking
for her elder daughter, and Longueville could not help wishing
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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 Ruling Passion by Henry van Dyke: end of the island, about an hour ago."
But Nataline said that they did not need the seal. There was still
food enough in the larder. On shore there must be greater need.
Marcel must take the seal over to the mainland that night and leave
it on the beach near the priest's house. He grumbled a little, but
he did it.
That was on the twenty-third of April. The clear sky held for three
days longer, calm, bright, halcyon weather. On the afternoon of the
twenty-seventh the clouds came down from the north, not a long
furious tempest, but a brief, sharp storm, with considerable wind
and a whirling, blinding fall of April snow. It was a bad night for
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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 Alcibiades II by Platonic Imitator: they were asking evil. He neither sought, nor supposed that he sought for
good, but others have had quite the contrary notion. I believe that if the
God whom you are about to consult should appear to you, and, in
anticipation of your request, enquired whether you would be contented to
become tyrant of Athens, and if this seemed in your eyes a small and mean
thing, should add to it the dominion of all Hellas; and seeing that even
then you would not be satisfied unless you were ruler of the whole of
Europe, should promise, not only that, but, if you so desired, should
proclaim to all mankind in one and the same day that Alcibiades, son of
Cleinias, was tyrant:--in such a case, I imagine, you would depart full of
joy, as one who had obtained the greatest of goods.
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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 Euthyphro by Plato: last, however, Socrates proposes to amend the definition, and say that
'what all the gods love is pious, and what they all hate is impious.' To
this Euthyphro agrees.
Socrates proceeds to analyze the new form of the definition. He shows that
in other cases the act precedes the state; e.g. the act of being carried,
loved, etc. precedes the state of being carried, loved, etc., and therefore
that which is dear to the gods is dear to the gods because it is first
loved of them, not loved of them because it is dear to them. But the pious
or holy is loved by the gods because it is pious or holy, which is
equivalent to saying, that it is loved by them because it is dear to them.
Here then appears to be a contradiction,--Euthyphro has been giving an
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