| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson by Mark Twain: the good fortune to secure them for an immediate drive, and to be
the first to display them in public. They entered his buggy with him
and were paraded down the main street, everybody flocking to the windows
and sidewalks to see.
The judge showed the strangers the new graveyard, and the jail,
and where the richest man lived, and the Freemasons' hall,
and the Methodist church, and the Presbyterian church, and where the
Baptist church was going to be when they got some money to build it with,
and showed them the town hall and the slaughterhouse, and got out
of the independent fire company in uniform and had them put out
an imaginary fire; then he let them inspect the muskets of the
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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 Wheels of Chance by H. G. Wells: rivalry and antagonism had sprung up between them, until they
could engender quite a vivid hatred from a dropped hairpin or the
cutting of a book with a sharpened knife. There is very little
deliberate wickedness in the world. The stupidity of our
selfishness gives much the same results indeed, but in the
ethical laboratory it shows a different nature. And when the
disaster came, Mrs. Milton's remorse for their gradual loss of
sympathy and her share in the losing of it, was genuine enough.
You may imagine the comfort she got from her friends, and how
West Kensington and Notting Hill and Hampstead, the literary
suburbs, those decent penitentiaries of a once Bohemian calling,
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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 Man against the Sky by Edwin Arlington Robinson: A flame half ready to fly out sometimes
At some annoyance may be fanned up in him,
But soon it falls, and when it falls goes out;
He knows how little room there is in there
For crude and futile animosities,
And how much for the joy of being whole,
And how much for long sorrow and old pain.
On our side there are some who may be given
To grow old wondering what he thinks of us
And some above us, who are, in his eyes,
Above himself, -- and that's quite right and English.
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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 $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories by Mark Twain: that would lead you to think 'all is not gold that glitters';
so be not rash in your resolution. It is better to repent now than
to do it in a more solemn hour. Yes, I know what you would say.
I know you have a costly gift for me--the noblest that man can make--
YOUR HEART! you should not offer it to one so unworthy.
Heaven, you know, has allowed my father's house to be made a house
of solitude, a home of silent obedience, which my parents say
is more to be admired than big names and high-sounding titles.
Notwithstanding all this, let me speak the emotions of an honest heart;
allow me to say in the fullness of my hopes that I anticipate
better days. The bird may stretch its wings toward the sun,
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