| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Collected Articles by Frederick Douglass: what was right, but distrusted the enlightenment of the loyal masses;
but what was forborne in distrust of the people must now be done
with a full knowledge that the people expect and require it.
The members go to Washington fresh from the inspiring presence of the people.
In every considerable public meeting, and in almost every conceivable way,
whether at court-house, school-house, or cross-roads, in doors and out,
the subject has been discussed, and the people have emphatically pronounced
in favor of a radical policy. Listening to the doctrines of expediency
and compromise with pity, impatience, and disgust, they have everywhere
broken into demonstrations of the wildest enthusiasm when a brave word
has been spoken in favor of equal rights and impartial suffrage.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Off on a Comet by Jules Verne: "Can you suppose that I am not aware that this island on which we
find you is what remains of the Ionian representative republic,
over which you English exercise the right of protection,
but have no claim of government?"
The colonel and the major looked at each other in amazement.
Although Count Timascheff secretly sympathized with Servadac,
he had carefully refrained from taking part in the dispute;
but he was on the point of interfering, when the colonel,
in a greatly subdued tone, begged to be allowed to speak.
"I begin to apprehend," he said, "that you must be la-boring under some
strange mistake. There is no room for questioning that the territory
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