| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Memoir of Fleeming Jenkin by Robert Louis Stevenson: soir-la, notre horizon intellectual s'est elargie, et nous y avons
pousse des reconnaissances profondes et lointaines. Apres avoir
vivement cause a table, nous avons longuement cause au salon; et
nous nous separions le soir a Trafalgar Square, apres avoir longe
les trotters, stationne aux coins des rues et deux fois rebrousse
chemie en nous reconduisant l'un l'autre. Il etait pres d'une
heure du matin! Mais quelle belle passe d'argumentation, quels
beaux echanges de sentiments, quelles fortes confidences
patriotiques nous avions fournies! J'ai compris ce soir la que
Jenkin ne detestait pas la France, et je lui serrai fort les mains
en l'embrassant. Nous nous quittions aussi amis qu'on puisse
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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 Battle of the Books by Jonathan Swift: powers; unless mankind were then very different from what it is
now; for I look upon the mass or body of our people here in England
to be as Freethinkers, that is to say, as staunch unbelievers, as
any of the highest rank. But I conceive some scattered notions
about a superior power to be of singular use for the common people,
as furnishing excellent materials to keep children quiet when they
grow peevish, and providing topics of amusement in a tedious winter
night.
Lastly, it is proposed, as a singular advantage, that the
abolishing of Christianity will very much contribute to the uniting
of Protestants, by enlarging the terms of communion, so as to take
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