| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Enchanted Island of Yew by L. Frank Baum: battering-rams and were trying to batter down the high wall; and they
had built several pairs of long ladders with which to climb over the
wall; and their soldiers were digging two tunnels in the ground in
order to crawl under the wall.
Not at once could they succeed, for the wall was strong and it would
take long to batter it down; and Nerle stood on top of the wall and
kicked over the ladders as fast as the soldiers of Twi set them up;
and the gray-bearded Ki stood in the garden holding two big flat boards
with which to whack the heads of any who might come through the tunnels.
But Prince Marvel realized that the perseverance of his foes might win
in the end, unless he took measures to defeat them effectually. So he
The Enchanted Island of Yew |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Scaramouche by Rafael Sabatini: like you. We all know the place held in the public esteem by
complacent husbands. But, in God's name, what place is there at
all for complacent fathers?"
Binet heaved himself up, a great towering mass of manhood. Violently
he shook off the restraining hand of Pierrot who sat on his left.
"A thousand devils!" he roared; "if you take that tone with me, I'll
break every bone in your filthy body."
"If you were to lay a finger on me, Binet, you would give me the
only provocation I still need to kill you." Andre-Louis was as
calm as ever, and therefore the more menacing. Alarm stirred the
company. He protruded from his pocket the butt of a pistol - newly
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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 Three Taverns by Edwin Arlington Robinson: And you must give me keys of yours to rooms I have not entered.
Do you see me on your threshold all my life, and there alone?
Will you tell me where you see me in your fancy -- when it leads you
Far enough beyond the moment for a glance at the abyss?"
"Will you tell me what intrinsic and amazing sort of nonsense
You are crowding on the patience of the man who gives you -- this?
Look around you and be sorry you're not living in an attic,
With a civet and a fish-net, and with you to pay the rent.
I say words that you can spell without the use of all your letters;
And I grant, if you insist, that I've a guess at what you meant."
"Have I told you, then, for nothing, that I met him? Are you trying
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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 Eve and David by Honore de Balzac: must think, child, when you see that the workshop is left to itself,
and that I am dead, as it were, to all business interests; but see,"
he continued, bringing her to the window, and pointing to the
mysterious shed, "there lies our fortune. For some months yet we must
endure our lot, but let us bear it patiently; leave me to solve the
problem of which I told you, and all our troubles will be at an end."
David was so good, his devotion was so thoroughly to be taken upon his
word, that the poor wife, with a wife's anxiety as to daily expenses,
determined to spare her husband the household cares and to take the
burden upon herself. So she came down from the pretty blue-and-white
room, where she sewed and talked contentedly with her mother, took
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