| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Marie by H. Rider Haggard: smoke. Another Quabie rushed on. Hans and I received him on the points
of our assegais, but so fierce was his charge that they went through him
as though he were nothing, and being but light, both of us were thrown
backwards to the ground. I scrambled to my feet again, defenceless now,
for the spear was broken in the Kaffir, and awaited the end. Looking
back once more I saw that Marie had either failed to get through the
window or abandoned the attempt. At any rate she was standing near the
chest supporting herself by her right hand. In my despair I seized the
blade end of the broken assegai and dragged it from the body of the
Kaffir, thinking that it would serve to kill her, then turned to do the
deed.
Marie |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Exiles by Honore de Balzac: "Well, go then, start! Fly by faith up from globe to globe, soar
through space! Thought, love, and faith are its mystical keys.
Traverse the circles, reach the throne! God is more merciful than you
are; He opens His temple to all His creatures. Only, do not forget the
pattern of Moses; put your shoes from off your feet, cast off all
filth, leave your body far behind; otherwise you shall be consumed;
for God--God is Light!"
Just as Doctor Sigier spoke these grand words, his face radiant, his
hand uplifted, a sunbeam pierced through an open window, like a magic
jet from a fount of splendor, a long triangular shaft of gold that lay
like a scarf over the whole assembly. They all clapped their hands,
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from At the Sign of the Cat & Racket by Honore de Balzac: opinions, had shown itself in a terrible form. Finally, at half-past
four in the afternoon, Augustine, pale, trembling, and with red eyes,
was haled before her father and mother. The poor child artlessly
related the too brief tale of her love. Reassured by a speech from her
father, who promised to listen to her in silence, she gathered courage
as she pronounced to her parents the name of Theodore de Sommervieux,
with a mischievous little emphasis on the aristocratic /de/. And
yielding to the unknown charm of talking of her feelings, she was
brave enough to declare with innocent decision that she loved Monsieur
de Sommervieux, that she had written to him, and she added, with tears
in her eyes: "To sacrifice me to another man would make me wretched."
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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 Myths and Myth-Makers by John Fiske: the researches of Jacob Grimm, and which, so far as concerns
the mythology of the Aryan race, is now victorious along the
whole line. It remains for us to test the universality of the
general principles upon which it is founded, by a brief
analysis of sundry legends and superstitions of the barbaric
world. Since the fetichistic habit of explaining the outward
phenomena of nature after the analogy of the inward phenomena
of conscious intelligence is not a habit peculiar to our Aryan
ancestors, but is, as psychology shows, the inevitable result
of the conditions under which uncivilized thinking proceeds,
we may expect to find the barbaric mind personifying the
Myths and Myth-Makers |
