| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The First Men In The Moon by H. G. Wells: multitude towards the apartments that were provided for me in the moon.
All about me were eyes, faces, masks, a leathery noise like the rustling
of beetle wings, and a great bleating and cricket-like twittering of
Selenite voices.
We gather he was taken to a "hexagonal apartment," and there for a space
he was confined. Afterwards he was given a much more considerable liberty;
indeed, almost as much freedom as one has in a civilised town on earth.
And it would appear that the mysterious being who is the ruler and master
of the moon appointed two Selenites "with large heads" to guard and study
him, and to establish whatever mental communications were possible with
him. And, amazing and incredible as it may seem, these two creatures,
The First Men In The Moon |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Adieu by Honore de Balzac: her reason by attempting a method which can only be employed,
unfortunately, by very rich people."
Then, like all persons living in solitude who are afflicted with an
ever present and ever renewed grief, he related to the marquis at
length the following narrative, which is here condensed, and relieved
of the many digressions made by both the narrator and the listener.
CHAPTER II
THE PASSAGE OF THE BERESINA
Marechal Victor, when he started, about nine at night, from the
heights of Studzianka, which he had defended, as the rear-guard of the
retreating army, during the whole day of November 28th, 1812, left a
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin: along just under the ceiling, which I thought judiciously placed
for change of air. I was at their church, where I was entertain'd
with good musick, the organ being accompanied with violins, hautboys,
flutes, clarinets, etc. I understood that their sermons were not
usually preached to mixed congregations of men, women, and children,
as is our common practice, but that they assembled sometimes
the married men, at other times their wives, then the young men,
the young women, and the little children, each division by itself.
The sermon I heard was to the latter, who came in and were plac'd in rows
on benches; the boys under the conduct of a young man, their tutor,
and the girls conducted by a young woman. The discourse seem'd
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin |
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 Virginibus Puerisque by Robert Louis Stevenson: on to the other side. The noise of the mallet and chisel is
scarcely quenched, the trumpets are hardly done blowing, when,
trailing with him clouds of glory, this happy-starred, full-
blooded spirit shoots into the spiritual land.
CHAPTER VI - EL DORADO
IT seems as if a great deal were attainable in a world
where there are so many marriages and decisive battles, and
where we all, at certain hours of the day, and with great
gusto and despatch, stow a portion of victuals finally and
irretrievably into the bag which contains us. And it would
seem also, on a hasty view, that the attainment of as much as
|
