| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Voyage to Arcturus by David Lindsay: able to look at it. It had the startling irregularity of continuous
lightning, but it possessed this further peculiarity - that it seemed
somehow to give out not actual light, but emotion, seen as light.
They continued to approach the wall of darkness, straight toward the
door. The glasslike water flowed right against it, its surface
reaching up almost to the threshold.
They could not speak any more; the noise was too deafening.
In a few minutes they were before the gateway. Nightspore turned his
back and hid his eyes in his two hands, but even then he was blinded
by the light. So passionate were his feelings that his body seemed
to enlarge itself. At every frightful beat of sound, he quivered
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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 Passionate Pilgrim by William Shakespeare: I do believe her, though I know she lies,
That she might think me some untutor'd youth,
Unskilful in the world's false forgeries,
Thus vainly thinking that she thinks me young,
Although I know my years be past the best,
I smiling credit her false-speaking tongue,
Outfacing faults in love with love's ill rest.
But wherefore says my love that she is young?
And wherefore say not I that I am old?
O, love's best habit is a soothing tongue,
And age, in love, loves not to have years told.
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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 What is Man? by Mark Twain: roof, and the shoe had turned into what the printers call a
"fist" with a finger pointing.
If I were now imprisoned on a mountain summit a hundred
miles northward of this point, and was denied a timepiece, I
could get along well enough from four till six on clear days, for
I could keep trace of the time by the changing shapes of these
mighty shadows of the Virgin's front, the most stupendous dial I
am acquainted with, the oldest clock in the world by a couple of
million years.
I suppose I should not have noticed the forms of the shadows
if I hadn't the habit of hunting for faces in the clouds and in
What is Man? |
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 Through the Looking-Glass by Lewis Carroll: whisper, for fear of frightening them), `and there are the White
King and the White Queen sitting on the edge of the shovel--and
here are two castles walking arm in arm--I don't think they can
hear me,' she went on, as she put her head closer down, `and I'm
nearly sure they can't see me. I feel somehow as if I were
invisible--'
Here something began squeaking on the table behind Alice, and
made her turn her head just in time to see one of the White Pawns
roll over and begin kicking: she watched it with great
curiosity to see what would happen next.
`It is the voice of my child!' the White Queen cried out as she
Through the Looking-Glass |
