The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Case of The Lamp That Went Out by Grace Isabel Colbron and Augusta Groner: connected with it.
Muller drew a deep breath. He felt much easier now that he had
arranged his thoughts and marshalled in orderly array all the facts
he had already gathered. There was nothing to do now but to follow
up a given path step by step and he could no longer reproach himself
that he might have cast suspicion on an innocent soul. No, his
bearing towards Mrs. Bernauer had not been sheer brutality. His
instinct, which had led him so unerringly so many times, had again
shown him the right way when he had thrust the accusation in her
face.
Now that his mind was easier he realised that he was very hungry.
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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 Lamentable Tragedy of Locrine and Mucedorus by William Shakespeare: man in all your life.
SEGASTO.
Now will I to court with sorrowful heart, rounded with
doubts.
If Amadine do live, then happy I:
Yea, happy I, if Amadine do live.
[Exeunt.]
ACT II. SCENE I. The Camp of the King of Arragon.
[Enter the King with a young prince prisoner, Amadine,
Tremelio, with Collen and counselors.]
KING.
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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 Twenty Years After by Alexandre Dumas: The king returned amidst the silence of a vast multitude to
the Palais Royal. All minds were uneasy, most were
foreboding, many of the people used threatening language.
At first, indeed, they were doubtful whether the king's
visit to the parliament had been in order to lighten or
increase their burdens; but scarcely was it known that the
taxes were to be still further increased, when cries of
"Down with Mazarin!" "Long live Broussel!" "Long live
Blancmesnil!" resounded through the city. For the people had
learned that Broussel and Blancmesnil had made speeches in
their behalf, and, although the eloquence of these deputies
 Twenty Years After |
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 Droll Stories, V. 1 by Honore de Balzac: one of his wife's hairs, where from I know not, seeing I was not
there, and kept in his hand this precious gauge of the warm virtue of
that lovely creature. Towards the morning, when the cock crew, the
wife slipped in beside her husband, and pretended to sleep. Then the
maid tapped gently on the happy man's forehead, whispering in his ear,
"It is time, get into your clothes and off you go--it's daylight." The
good man grieved to lose his treasure, and wished to see the source of
his vanished happiness.
"Oh! Oh!" said he, proceeding to compare certain things, "I've got
light hair, and this is dark."
"What have you done?" said the servant; "Madame will see she has been
 Droll Stories, V. 1 |