| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Village Rector by Honore de Balzac: that the streams which watered certain parts of upper Montegnac came
from the mountains of the Correze. This chain of hills joined the
barren slopes we have already described, parallel with the chain of
the Roche-Vive.
On returning from this walk the rector was joyful as a child; he
foresaw, with the naivete of a poet, the prosperity of his dear
village--for a poet is a man, is he not? who realizes hopes before
they ripen. Monsieur Bonnet garnered his hay as he stood overlooking
that barren plain from Madame Graslin's upper terrace.
XV
STORY OF A GALLEY-SLAVE
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Summer by Edith Wharton: did not know how to choose, and to keep bad
fellows at a distance....Charity slipped down from the
bed, and stretched out her hands.
"Is it sewed? Let me try it on again." She put the hat
on, and smiled at her image. The thought of Julia had
vanished....
The next morning she was up before dawn, and saw the
yellow sunrise broaden behind the hills, and the
silvery luster preceding a hot day tremble across the
sleeping fields.
Her plans had been made with great care. She had
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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 Bureaucracy by Honore de Balzac: The cashier listened and heard, but reluctantly and against his will.
These rapid remarks, murmured as they were, struck his ear by one of
those acoustic rebounds which are very little studied. As he heard
these political confidences, however, a keen alarm took possession of
his soul. He was one of those simple-minded beings, who are shocked at
listening to anything they are not intended to hear, or entering where
they are not invited, and seeming bold when they are really timid,
inquisitive where they are truly discreet. The cashier accordingly
began to glide along the carpet and edge himself away, so that the
minister saw him at a distance when he first took notice of him.
Saillard was a ministerial henchman absolutely incapable of
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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 When the Sleeper Wakes by H. G. Wells: now so far behind him, the conception of a free and
equal manhood had become a very real thing to him.
He had hoped, as indeed his age had hoped, rashly
taking it for granted, that the sacrifice of the many
to the few would some day cease, that a day was near
when every child born of woman should have a fair
and assured chance of happiness. And here, after two
hundred years, the same hope, still unfulfilled, cried
passionately through the city. After two hundred
years, he knew, greater than ever, grown with the city
to gigantic proportions, were poverty and helpless
When the Sleeper Wakes |
