| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Unseen World and Other Essays by John Fiske: continues, "nearly every law, according to which the prosperity
of a country becomes progressive, was habitually violated." On
turning to the Netherlands we find the most complete contrast,
both in historical conditions and in social results; and the
success of the Netherlands in their long struggle becomes easily
intelligible. The Dutch and Flemish provinces had formed a part
of the renovated Roman Empire of Charles the Great and the Othos.
Taking advantage of the perennial contest for supremacy between
the popes and the Roman emperors, the constituent baronies and
municipalities of the Empire succeeded in acquiring and
maintaining a practical though unrecognized independence; and
The Unseen World and Other Essays |
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 War in the Air by H. G. Wells: remained a fairly popular sport, and continued to lift gravel
from the wharf of the Bun Hill gas-works and drop it upon
deserving people's lawns and gardens. There were half a dozen
reassuring years for Tom--at least so far as flying was
concerned. But that was the great time of mono-rail development,
and his anxiety was only diverted from the high heavens by the
most urgent threats and symptoms of change in the lower sky.
There had been talk of mono-rails for several years. But the
real mischief began when Brennan sprang his gyroscopic mono-rail
car upon the Royal Society. It was the leading sensation of the
1907 soirees; that celebrated demonstration-room was all too
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