| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe: malignity not only in the distemper to communicate itself, but in the
very nature of man, prompting him with evil will or
an evil eye, that, as they say in the case of a mad dog, who though the
gentlest creature before of any of his kind, yet then will fly upon and
bite any one that comes next him, and those as soon as any who had
been most observed by him before.
Others placed it to the account of the corruption of human nature,
who cannot bear to see itself more miserable than others of its own
species, and has a kind of involuntary wish that all men were as
unhappy or in as bad a condition as itself.
Others say it was only a kind of desperation, not knowing or
A Journal of the Plague Year |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Door in the Wall, et. al. by H. G. Wells: With that my suspicions returned. The thing might, after all, be
merely a lump of that almost equally hard substance, corundum, with
an accidental resemblance in shape to the diamond. Or if it was a
diamond, how came he by it, and why should he offer it at a hundred
pounds?
We looked into one another's eyes. He seemed eager, but
honestly eager. At that moment I believed it was a diamond he was
trying to sell. Yet I am a poor man, a hundred pounds would leave
a visible gap in my fortunes and no sane man would buy a diamond by
gaslight from a ragged tramp on his personal warranty only. Still,
a diamond that size conjured up a vision of many thousands of
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Master and Man by Leo Tolstoy: would not abandon him. He gave a deep sigh, and keeping the
sackcloth over his head he got inside the sledge and lay down
in the place where his master had been.
But he could not get warm in the sledge either. At first he
shivered all over, then the shivering ceased and little by
little he began to lose consciousness. He did not know whether
he was dying or falling asleep, but felt equally prepared for
the one as for the other.
VIII
Meanwhile Vasili Andreevich, with his feet and the ends of the
reins, urged the horse on in the direction in which for some
Master and Man |
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 Miracle Mongers and Their Methods by Harry Houdini: and finally became one of the leading
Continental magicians, boasting that he was one
of the few really expert sleight-of-hand
magicians of the world.
I met Weyer at Liege, Belgium, where we
had an all-night match with playing cards. He
admitted that there were some tricks he did
not know, but he claimed that after once seeing
any magician work he could duplicate the
tricks. On this occasion, however, he was
unable to make the boast good.
Miracle Mongers and Their Methods |
