| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Timaeus by Plato: is given; and the whole affection and the cause of the affection are both
termed cold. That is called hard to which our flesh yields, and soft which
yields to our flesh; and things are also termed hard and soft relatively to
one another. That which yields has a small base; but that which rests on
quadrangular bases is firmly posed and belongs to the class which offers
the greatest resistance; so too does that which is the most compact and
therefore most repellent. The nature of the light and the heavy will be
best understood when examined in connexion with our notions of above and
below; for it is quite a mistake to suppose that the universe is parted
into two regions, separate from and opposite to each other, the one a lower
to which all things tend which have any bulk, and an upper to which things
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Fantastic Fables by Ambrose Bierce: hundred and fifty kinds of assorted snakes. The glass breaking,
the reptiles all escaped into the street.
"When you can't do what you wish," said the Public-spirited
Citizen, "it is worth while to do what you can."
Fortune and the Fabulist
A WRITER of Fables was passing through a lonely forest when he met
a Fortune. Greatly alarmed, he tried to climb a tree, but the
Fortune pulled him down and bestowed itself upon him with cruel
persistence.
"Why did you try to run away?" said the Fortune, when his struggles
had ceased and his screams were stilled. "Why do you glare at me
Fantastic Fables |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Betty Zane by Zane Grey: believed Miller had joined the Indians, who had undoubtedly been waiting for
him, or for a signal from him, and that he would use them to ambush the trail.
Therefore Wetzel decided he would try to strike Miller's tracks far west of
the river. He risked a great deal in attempting this because it was possible
he might fail to find any trace of the spy. But Wetzel wasted not one second.
His course was chosen. With all possible speed, which meant with him walking
only when he could not run, he traveled northwest. If Miller had taken the
direction Wetzel suspected, the trails of the two men would cross about ten
miles from the Ohio. But the hunter had not traversed more than a mile of the
forest when the dog put his nose high in the air and growled. Wetzel slowed
down into a walk and moved cautiously onward, peering through the green aisles
Betty Zane |
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 Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte by Karl Marx: other, the party of the allied royalists; of Order, and of the large
bourgeoisie.
At the inauguration of his presidency, Bonaparte forthwith framed a
ministry out of the party of Order, at whose head he placed Odillon
Barrot, be it noted, the old leader of the liberal wing of the
parliamentary bourgeoisie. Mr. Barrot had finally hunted down a seat in
the ministry, the spook of which had been pursuing him since 1830; and
what is more, he had the chairmanship in this ministry, although not, as
he had imagined under Louis Philippe, the promoted leader of the
parliamentary opposition, but with the commission to kill a parliament,
and, moreover, as an ally of all his arch enemies, the Jesuits and the
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