| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen: He lived to exert, and frequently to enjoy himself.
His wife was not always out of humour, nor his home
always uncomfortable; and in his breed of horses and dogs,
and in sporting of every kind, he found no inconsiderable
degree of domestic felicity.
For Marianne, however--in spite of his incivility
in surviving her loss--he always retained that decided
regard which interested him in every thing that befell her,
and made her his secret standard of perfection in woman;--
and many a rising beauty would be slighted by him in
after-days as bearing no comparison with Mrs. Brandon.
Sense and Sensibility |
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: times to ask for twenty francs. She did not know that we never have
twenty francs. One has a thousand francs, or one sends to one's notary
for five hundred; but twenty francs I have never had in my life. My
cook and my maid may, perhaps, have so much between them; but for my
own part, I have nothing but credit, and I should lose that if I took
to borrowing small sums. If I were to ask for twenty francs, I should
have nothing to distinguish me from my colleagues that walk the
boulevard."
"Is the milliner paid?" asked La Palferine.
"Oh, come now, are you turning stupid?" said she, with a wink. "She
came this morning for the twenty-seventh time, that is how I came to
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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 Lord Arthur Savile's Crime, etc. by Oscar Wilde: out, my reason was left to its own unimpassioned judgment. However
it came about, and I cannot pretend to explain it, there was no
doubt that Willie Hughes suddenly became to me a mere myth, an idle
dream, the boyish fancy of a young man who, like most ardent
spirits, was more anxious to convince others than to be himself
convinced.
As I had said some very unjust and bitter things to Erskine in my
letter, I determined to go and see him at once, and to make my
apologies to him for my behaviour. Accordingly, the next morning I
drove down to Birdcage Walk, and found Erskine sitting in his
library, with the forged picture of Willie Hughes in front of him.
|
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 Tanglewood Tales by Nathaniel Hawthorne: wondered how it had grown up so suddenly out of the earth. But
soon he saw the mountain move. As it came nearer and nearer,
what should it turn out to be but a human shape, not so big as
Antaeus, it is true, although a very enormous figure, in
comparison with Pygmies, and a vast deal bigger than the men we
see nowadays.
When the Pygmy was quite satisfied that his eyes had not
deceived him, he scampered, as fast as his legs would carry
him, to the Giant's ear, and stooping over its cavity, shouted
lustily into it:
"Halloo, brother Antaeus! Get up this minute, and take your
Tanglewood Tales |
