| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Camille by Alexandre Dumas: why you went to see Prudence."
"To see her."
"That's a lie, my friend."
"Well, I went to ask her if the horse was any better, and if she
wanted your shawl and your jewels any longer."
Marguerite blushed, but did not answer.
"And," I continued, "I learned what you had done with your
horses, shawls, and jewels."
"And you are vexed?"
"I am vexed that it never occurred to you to ask me for what you
were in want of."
Camille |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Travels with a Donkey in the Cevenne by Robert Louis Stevenson: difficulty as to my reception. Modestine was led away by a layman
to the stables, and I and my pack were received into Our Lady of
the Snows.
THE MONKS
FATHER MICHAEL, a pleasant, fresh-faced, smiling man, perhaps of
thirty-five, took me to the pantry, and gave me a glass of liqueur
to stay me until dinner. We had some talk, or rather I should say
he listened to my prattle indulgently enough, but with an
abstracted air, like a spirit with a thing of clay. And truly,
when I remember that I descanted principally on my appetite, and
that it must have been by that time more than eighteen hours since
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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 New Machiavelli by H. G. Wells: mother's attentive, meticulous but occasionally extremely irascible
Providence, the talk was all of the Struggle for Existenc and the
survival not of the Best--that was nonsense, but of the fittest to
survive.
The attempts to rehabilitate Faith in the form of the
Individualist's LAISSEZ FAIRE never won upon me. I disliked Herbert
Spencer all my life until I read his autobiography, and then I
laughed a little and loved him. I remember as early as the City
Merchants' days how Britten and I scoffed at that pompous question-
begging word "Evolution," having, so to speak, found it out.
Evolution, some illuminating talker had remarked at the Britten
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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 A Voyage to Abyssinia by Father Lobo: company to take care of them.
We had not waited many days before some messengers came to us with
an account that Father Baradas, with the Emperor's nephew, and many
other persons of distinction, waited for us at some distance; we
loaded our camels, and following the course of the river, came in
seven hours to the place we were directed to halt at. Father Manuel
Baradas and all the company, who had waited for us a considerable
time on the top of the mountain, came down when they saw our tents,
and congratulated our arrival. It is not easy to express the
benevolence and tenderness with which they embraced us, and the
concern they showed at seeing us worn away with hunger, labour, and
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