| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Pierrette by Honore de Balzac: recognized by the French faculty,--a potential worthy of the medicinal
properties of our roses."
"That is one of the caprices of caprice," said the old gentleman.
"Bordeaux wine was unknown a hundred years ago. Marechal de Richelieu,
one of the noted men of the last century, the French Alcibiades, was
appointed governor of Guyenne. His lungs were diseased, and, heaven
knows why! the wine of the country did him good and he recovered.
Bordeaux instantly made a hundred millions; the marshal widened its
territory to Angouleme, to Cahors,--in short, to over a hundred miles
of circumference! it is hard to tell where the Bordeaux vineyards end.
And yet they haven't erected an equestrian statue to the marshal in
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Aesop's Fables by Aesop: know where to go. As soon as they saw a single animal approach
them, off they used to run. One day they saw a troop of wild
Horses stampeding about, and in quite a panic all the Hares
scuttled off to a lake hard by, determined to drown themselves
rather than live in such a continual state of fear. But just as
they got near the bank of the lake, a troop of Frogs, frightened
in their turn by the approach of the Hares scuttled off, and
jumped into the water. "Truly," said one of the Hares, "things
are not so bad as they seem:
"There is always someone worse off than yourself."
The Wolf and the Kid
Aesop's Fables |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Boys' Life of Abraham Lincoln by Helen Nicolay: Year. The occasion is made gay with music and flowers and bright
uniforms, and has a social as well as an official character. Even
in war times such customs were kept up, and in spite of his load
of care, the President was expected to find time and heart for
the greetings and questions and hand-shakings of this and other
state ceremonies. Ordinarily it was not hard for him. He liked to
meet people, and such occasions were a positive relief from the
mental strain of his official work. It is to be questioned,
however, whether, on this day, his mind did not leave the passing
stream of people before him, to dwell on the proclamation he was
so soon to sign.
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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 Whirligigs by O. Henry: menagerie by about a couple of nights. And then, at the
ebb tide, we were walking up a street that parallels and
parodies Broadway.
A woman with a comely and mundane countenance
passed us, holding in leash a wheezing, vicious, waddling,
brute of a yellow pug. The dog entangled himself with
Bridger's legs and mumbled his ankles in a snarling,
peevish, sulky bite. Bridger, with a happy smile, kicked
the breath out of the brute; the woman showered us
with a quick rain of well-conceived adjectives that left
us in no doubt as to our place in her opinion, and we
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