| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Mansion by Henry van Dyke: even if there were some faults in his character--and all men are
sinners--
yet he surely believed in the saving doctrines of religion--the
forgiveness
of sins, the resurrection of the body, the life everlasting.
Yes, that was the true source of comfort, after all. He would
read a bit
in the Bible, as he did every night, and go to bed and to sleep.
He went back to his chair at the library table. A strange weight
of
weariness rested upon him, but he opened the book at a familiar
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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 Call of the Wild by Jack London: For the most part, however, Buck's love was expressed in
adoration. While he went wild with happiness when Thornton
touched him or spoke to him, he did not seek these tokens. Unlike
Skeet, who was wont to shove her nose under Thornton's hand and
nudge and nudge till petted, or Nig, who would stalk up and rest
his great head on Thornton's knee, Buck was content to adore at a
distance. He would lie by the hour, eager, alert, at Thornton's
feet, looking up into his face, dwelling upon it, studying it,
following with keenest interest each fleeting expression, every
movement or change of feature. Or, as chance might have it, he
would lie farther away, to the side or rear, watching the outlines
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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 Selected Writings of Guy De Maupassant by Guy De Maupassant: passionate care he worked at his phrases, and how indefatigably
he changed them over and over again. Thus he satisfied that
instinct of beauty which was born of his romantic soul, while he
gratified the demand of truth which inhered from his scientific
training by his minute and scrupulous exactness.
The theory of the mean of truth on one side, as the foundation of
the subject,--"the humble truth," as he termed it at the
beginning of "Une Vie,"--and of the agonizing of beauty on the
other side, in composition, determines the whole use that
Maupassant made of his literary gifts. It helped to make more
intense and more systematic that dainty yet dangerous pessimism
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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 Barnaby Rudge by Charles Dickens: in silence. She needed a pretty considerable stretch of patience,
for when the long letter had been read once all through it was read
again, and when it had been read twice all through it was read
again. During this tedious process, Dolly beguiled the time in the
most improving manner that occurred to her, by curling her hair on
her fingers, with the aid of the looking-glass before mentioned,
and giving it some killing twists.
Everything has an end. Even young ladies in love cannot read their
letters for ever. In course of time the packet was folded up, and
it only remained to write the answer.
But as this promised to be a work of time likewise, Emma said she
Barnaby Rudge |
