| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Father Sergius by Leo Tolstoy: 'O God, what have I done! Stiva!'
'Don't touch me! Don't touch me! Oh, how it pains!'
He turned away and went to the house. There he met her mother.
'What is the matter, Prince? I . . .' She became silent on
seeing his face. The blood had suddenly rushed to his head.
'You knew it, and used me to shield them! If you weren't a woman
. . . !' he cried, lifting his enormous fist, and turning aside
he ran away.
Had his fiancee's lover been a private person he would have
killed him, but it was his beloved Tsar.
Next day he applied both for furlough and his discharge, and
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Personal Record by Joseph Conrad: Cristo and the Chateau daft in full light, seemed to float toward
us--so steady, so imperceptible was the progress of our boat.
"Keep her in the furrow of the moon," the patron directed me, in
a quiet murmur, sitting down ponderously in the stern-sheets and
reaching for his pipe.
The pilot station in weather like this was only a mile or two to
the westward of the islets; and presently, as we approached the
spot, the boat we were going to relieve swam into our view
suddenly, on her way home, cutting black and sinister into the
wake of the moon under a sable wing, while to them our sail must
have been a vision of white and dazzling radiance. Without
 A Personal Record |