| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Miracle Mongers and Their Methods by Harry Houdini: of mechanics, chapter of equilibrium.
We propose to point out here a certain
number of such artifices and to describe
a few of the experiments, utilizing for this
purpose the data furnished by Mr. Perry,
as well as those resulting from our own
observations.
One of the experiments consists in having
a man or several men hold a cane or
a billiard cue horizontally above the head,
as shown in Fig. 1. On pushing with one
Miracle Mongers and Their Methods |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Shadow out of Time by H. P. Lovecraft: permanent projection of elder minds arose many of those lasting
changes of personality noticed in later history - including mankind's.
As for the ordinary cases of exploration - when the displacing
mind had learned what it wished in the future, it would build
an apparatus like that which had started its flight and reverse
the process of projection. Once more it would be in its own body
in its own age, while the lately captive mind would return to
that body of the future to which it properly belonged.
Only
when one or the other of the bodies had died during the exchange
was this restoration impossible. In such cases, of course, the
Shadow out of Time |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Ancient Regime by Charles Kingsley: democracy as did the invention of firearms. A tribe of riders must
have been always, more or less, equal and free. Equal because a man
on a horse would feel himself a man indeed; because the art of
riding called out an independence, a self-help, a skill, a
consciousness of power, a personal pride and vanity, which would
defy slavery. Free, because a tribe of riders might be defeated,
exterminated, but never enchained. They could never become gleboe
adscripti, bound to the soil, as long as they could take horse and
saddle, and away. History gives us more than one glimpse of such
tribes--the scourge and terror of the non-riding races with whom
they came in contact. Some, doubtless, remember how in the wars
|
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 The Mysterious Island by Jules Verne: "We shall find it some day!" said Gideon Spilett.
"Well!" exclaimed Pencroft, "when that day comes, I do not know what more
will be wanting in our island!"
These different plants, which had been carefully rooted up, were carried
to the canoe, where Cyrus Harding had remained buried in thought.
The reporter, Herbert, and Pencroft in this manner frequently
disembarked, sometimes on the right bank, sometimes on the left bank of the
Mercy.
The latter was less abrupt, but the former more wooded. The engineer
ascertained by consulting his pocket-compass that the direction of the
river from the first turn was obviously southwest and northeast, and nearly
The Mysterious Island |
