| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Iron Puddler by James J. Davis: listening for a while I learned that "Jazz Davis" was the man he
was electioneering for. He caught sight of my face and said:
"There he is now."
"My name isn't Jazz," I said. I handed him my card. It read:
JAS. J. DAVIS
"What is it then?" he asked.
I saw that I would lose a vote if I humiliated him. So I
laughed and said: "Yep, I'm him. I was just kidding. I'm mighty
glad to have your support. Have a cigar."
But I went away worried. My personal friends knew me as Jimmy.
The men electioneered and handed cards to thought my name was
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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 Perfect Wagnerite: A Commentary on the Niblung's Ring by George Bernard Shaw: order, patriotism, and learning, he promptly uses his freedom to
put on a headier set of chains; expels anti-militarists with the
blood-thirstiest martial anti-foreign ardor; and gives the Kaiser
reason to thank heaven that he was born in the comparative
freedom and Laodicean tolerance of Kingship, and not in the
Calvinistic bigotry and pedantry of Marxism.
Why, then, you may ask, do I say that I am bound to Germany by
the ties that hold my nature most strongly? Very simply because I
should have perished of despair in my youth but for the world
created for me by that great German dynasty which began with Bach
and will perhaps not end with Richard Strauss. Do not suppose for
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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 Tom Grogan by F. Hopkinson Smith: I goes to Mrs. Todd, an' she come wid me. If he loses the job
now, we're in the street. Only two weeks' work since las' fall,
an' the girl gettin' worse every day, and every cint in the bank
gone, an' hardly a chair lef' in the place. An' I says to him,
'I'll go meself. She come in to see Katie th' other night; she'll
listen to me.' We lived in Newark, mum, an' had four rooms and a
mahogany sofa and two carpets, till the strike come in the
clock-factory, an' me man had to quit; an' then all winter--oh,
we're not used to the likes of this!"--covering her face with her
shawl and bursting into tears.
Tom had risen to her feet, her face expressing the deepest
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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 Faraday as a Discoverer by John Tyndall: man, and this should never be forgotten: he at once wrote to
Faraday, and afterwards, when an opportunity occurred, made him his
assistant.[1] Mr. Gassiot has lately favoured me with the following
reminiscence of this time:--
'Clapham Common, Surrey,
'November 28, 1867.
'My Dear Tyndall,--Sir H. Davy was accustomed to call on the late
Mr. Pepys, in the Poultry, on his way to the London Institution, of
which Pepys was one of the original managers; the latter told me
that on one occasion Sir H. Davy, showing him a letter, said:
"Pepys, what am I to do, here is a letter from a young man named
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