| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Men of Iron by Howard Pyle: God, and haply thou wilt come out of this bout honorably in spite
of the rawness of thy youth."
Just then Edmund Wilkes presented the cup of wine to Myles, who
drank it off at a draught, and thereupon Gascoyne replaced the
helm and tied the thongs.
The charge that Sir James Lee had given to Myles to strike at his
adversary's helm was a piece of advice he probably would not have
given to so young a knight, excepting as a last resort. A blow
perfectly delivered upon the helm was of all others the most
difficult for the recipient to recover from, but then a blow upon
the helm was not one time in fifty perfectly given. The huge
Men of Iron |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Poems of Goethe, Bowring, Tr. by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe: THE GODLIKE.
NOBLE be man,
Helpful and good!
For that alone
Distinguisheth him
From all the beings
Unto us known.
Hail to the beings,
Unknown and glorious,
Whom we forebode!
From his example
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu by Sax Rohmer: Yan performed a curious little shrug, rather of the back than of
the shoulders, and shuffled to the box which bore the smoky lamp.
Holding a needle in the flame, he dipped it, when red-hot, into an old
cocoa tin, and withdrew it with a bead of opium adhering to the end.
Slowly roasting this over the lamp, he dropped it into the bowl
of the metal pipe which he held ready, where it burned with a
spirituous blue flame.
"Pass it over," said Smith huskily, and rose on his knees with the assumed
eagerness of a slave to the drug.
Yan handed him the pipe, which he promptly put to his lips,
and prepared another for me.
The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu |
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 The First Men In The Moon by H. G. Wells: despair; "lie down!"
I touched it, and halted. "Too late!" screamed despair; "lie down!"
I fought stiffly with it. I was on the manhole lip, a stupefied, half-dead
being. The snow was all about me. I pulled myself in. There lurked within
a little warmer air.
The snowflakes - the airflakes - danced in about me, as I tried with
chilling hands to thrust the valve in and spun it tight and hard. I
sobbed. "I will," I chattered in my teeth. And then, with fingers that
quivered and felt brittle, I turned to the shutter studs.
As I fumbled with the switches - for I had never controlled them before -
I could see dimly through the steaming glass the blazing red streamers of
The First Men In The Moon |
