The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from When a Man Marries by Mary Roberts Rinehart: quarantine, like ourselves."
"We've missed him for a week," one of the guards said with a
grin. "We've been real anxious about you, Tubby. Ain't a week
goes by, when you're in health, that we don't hear something of
you."
Mr. McGuirk muttered something under his breath, and the men
chuckled.
"It seems," Tom said, interpreting, "that he doesn't like us
much. He doesn't like the food, and he doesn't like the beds. He
says just when he got a good place fixed up in the coal cellar,
Flannigan found it, and is asleep there now, this minute."
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Desert Gold by Zane Grey: saw Thorne's face corded by black veins, and his teeth exposed like
those of a snarling wolf. These rangers, who had coolly risked
death many times, and had dealt it often, were white as no fear
or pain could have made them. Then, on the moment, Yaqui raised
his hand, not clenched or doubled tight, but curled rigid like an
eagle's claw; and he shook it in a strange, slow gesture which
was menacing and terrible.
It was the woman that called to the depths of these men. And
their passion to kill and to save was surpassed only by the wild
hate which was yet love, the unfathomable emotion of a peon
slave. Gale marveled at it, while he felt his whole being cold
 Desert Gold |
The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Theaetetus by Plato: comply with the request of Theaetetus.
THEODORUS: Not comply! for what reason?
SOCRATES: My reason is that I have a kind of reverence; not so much for
Melissus and the others, who say that 'All is one and at rest,' as for the
great leader himself, Parmenides, venerable and awful, as in Homeric
language he may be called;--him I should be ashamed to approach in a spirit
unworthy of him. I met him when he was an old man, and I was a mere youth,
and he appeared to me to have a glorious depth of mind. And I am afraid
that we may not understand his words, and may be still further from
understanding his meaning; above all I fear that the nature of knowledge,
which is the main subject of our discussion, may be thrust out of sight by
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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 Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz by L. Frank Baum: belonged to the Wicked Witch. Have you them here with you?"
"No; I lost them somewhere in the air," explained the child. "But the
second time I went to the Land of Oz I owned the Nome King's Magic
Belt, which is much more powerful than were the Silver Shoes."
"Where is that Magic Belt?" enquired the Wizard, who had listened with
great interest.
"Ozma has it; for its powers won't work in a common, ordinary country
like the United States. Anyone in a fairy country like the Land of Oz
can do anything with it; so I left it with my friend the Princess
Ozma, who used it to wish me in Australia with Uncle Henry."
"And were you?" asked Zeb, astonished at what he heard.
 Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz |