| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Lily of the Valley by Honore de Balzac: of their moral physiognomies reappear; they mutually judge each other,
and it often happens during this reaction of the character after
passion, that natural antipathies leading to disunion (which
superficial people seize upon to accuse the human heart of
instability) come to the surface. This period now began with me. Less
blinded by seductions, and dissecting, as it were, my pleasure, I
undertook, without perhaps intending to do so, a critical examination
of Lady Dudley which resulted to her injury.
In the first place, I found her wanting in the qualities of mind which
distinguish Frenchwomen and make them so delightful to love; as all
those who have had the opportunity of loving in both countries
The Lily of the Valley |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from At the Mountains of Madness by H. P. Lovecraft: indeed, as our eyes followed it to the right and left along the
base of the low, gradual foothills which separated it from the
actual mountain rim, we decided that we could see no thinning
at all except for an interruption at the left of the pass through
which we had come. We had merely struck, at random, a limited
part of something of incalculable extent. The foothills were more
sparsely sprinkled with grotesque stone structures, linking the
terrible city to the already familiar cubes and ramparts which
evidently formed its mountain outposts. These latter, as well
as the queer cave mouths, were as thick on the inner as on the
outer sides of the mountains.
At the Mountains of Madness |
