| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Island of Doctor Moreau by H. G. Wells: what science has to teach must see that it is a little thing.
It may be that save in this little planet, this speck of cosmic dust,
invisible long before the nearest star could be attained--it may be,
I say, that nowhere else does this thing called pain occur.
But the laws we feel our way towards--Why, even on this earth, even among
living things, what pain is there?"
As he spoke he drew a little penknife from his pocket, opened the
smaller blade, and moved his chair so that I could see his thigh.
Then, choosing the place deliberately, he drove the blade into
his leg and withdrew it.
"No doubt," he said, "you have seen that before. It does not hurt
The Island of Doctor Moreau |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Arrow of Gold by Joseph Conrad: with his own hand some compliments and an inquiry about the spirit
of the population. My uncle read the letter, looked up at me with
an air of mournful awe, and begged me to tell his excellency that
the people were all for God, their lawful King and their old
privileges. I said to him then, after he had asked me about the
health of His Majesty in an awfully gloomy tone - I said then:
'There is only one thing that remains for me to do, uncle, and that
is to give you two pounds of the very best snuff I have brought
here for you.' What else could I have got for the poor old man? I
had no trunks with me. I had to leave behind a spare pair of shoes
in the hotel to make room in my little bag for that snuff. And
The Arrow of Gold |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift: in the art of making good bacon, so much wanted among us by the
great destruction of pigs, too frequent at our tables; which are
no way comparable in taste or magnificence to a well grown, fat
yearly child, which roasted whole will make a considerable figure
at a Lord Mayor's feast, or any other publick entertainment. But
this, and many others, I omit, being studious of brevity.
Supposing that one thousand families in this city, would be
constant customers for infants flesh, besides others who might
have it at merry meetings, particularly at weddings and
christenings, I compute that Dublin would take off annually about
twenty thousand carcasses; and the rest of the kingdom (where
A Modest Proposal |
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 Dark Lady of the Sonnets by George Bernard Shaw: that this description implies; whose very existence is an insult to
the ideal it realizes; whose eye disparages, whose resonant voice
denounces, whose cold shoulder jostles every decency, every delicacy,
every amenity, every dignity, every sweet usage of that quiet life of
mutual admiration in which perfect Shakespearian appreciation is
expected to arise, that man is Frank Harris. Here is one who is
extraordinarily qualified, by a range of sympathy and understanding
that extends from the ribaldry of a buccaneer to the shyest
tendernesses of the most sensitive poetry, to be all things to all
men, yet whose proud humor it is to be to every man, provided the man
is eminent and pretentious, the champion of his enemies. To the
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