| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Herbert West: Reanimator by H. P. Lovecraft: modifications of the vital solution.
One thing had uttered a
nerve-shattering scream; another had risen violently, beaten us
both to unconsciousness, and run amuck in a shocking way before
it could be placed behind asylum bars; still another, a loathsome
African monstrosity, had clawed out of its shallow grave and done
a deed -- West had had to shoot that object. We could not get
bodies fresh enough to shew any trace of reason when reanimated,
so had perforce created nameless horrors. It was disturbing to
think that one, perhaps two, of our monsters still lived -- that
thought haunted us shadowingly, till finally West disappeared
Herbert West: Reanimator |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Lady Windermere's Fan by Oscar Wilde: not!
CECIL GRAHAM. Oh! Wicked women bother one. Good women bore one.
That is the only difference between them.
LORD AUGUSTUS. [Puffing a cigar.] Mrs. Erlynne has a future
before her.
DUMBY. Mrs. Erlynne has a past before her.
LORD AUGUSTUS. I prefer women with a past. They're always so
demmed amusing to talk to.
CECIL GRAHAM. Well, you'll have lots of topics of conversation
with HER, Tuppy. [Rising and going to him.]
LORD AUGUSTUS. You're getting annoying, dear-boy; you're getting
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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 To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf: Lily Briscoe believed people must have for the world to go on at all?
Every one could not be as helter skelter, hand to mouth as she was. But
if they knew, could they tell one what they knew? Sitting on the floor
with her arms round Mrs Ramsay's knees, close as she could get, smiling
to think that Mrs Ramsay would never know the reason of that pressure, she
imagined how in the chambers of the mind and heart of the woman who was,
physically, touching her, were stood, like the treasures in the tombs of
kings, tablets bearing sacred inscriptions, which if one could spell them
out, would teach one everything, but they would never be offered openly,
never made public. What art was there, known to love or cunning, by which
one pressed through into those secret chambers? What device for becoming,
To the Lighthouse |
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 Scaramouche by Rafael Sabatini: handsome countenance was sternly set, whose great sombre eyes
mouldered as if with suppressed anger.
Thus face to face, each looking into the eyes of the other, they
stood for a long moment, the jostling crowd streaming past them,
unheeded. Then Andre-Louis laughed.
"That fellow, too, has a very dangerous gift of eloquence, M. le
Marquis," he said. "In fact there are a number of such in France
to-day. They grow from the soil, which you and yours have irrigated
with the blood of the martyrs of liberty. Soon it may be your blood
instead. The soil is parched, and thirsty for it."
"Gallows-bird!" he was answered. "The police will do your affair
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