| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells: 'eat? Sticks to cook yer! What we got to do is to go as near
as the ground'll let us, and then drive a trench."
"Blow yer trenches! You always want trenches; you ought
to ha" been born a rabbit Snippy."
"'Ain't they got any necks, then?" said a third, abruptly--
a little, contemplative, dark man, smoking a pipe.
I repeated my description.
"Octopuses," said he, "that's what I calls 'em. Talk about
fishers of men--fighters of fish it is this time!"
"It ain't no murder killing beasts like that," said the first
speaker.
War of the Worlds |
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 Seraphita by Honore de Balzac: being whom we call Seraphita seems to me one of those rare and
terrible spirits to whom power is given to bind men, to crush nature,
to enter into participation of the occult power of God. The course of
her enchantments over me began on that first day, when silence as to
her was imposed upon me against my will. Each time that I have wished
to question you it seemed as though I were about to reveal a secret of
which I ought to be the incorruptible guardian. Whenever I have tried
to speak, a burning seal has been laid upon my lips, and I myself have
become the involuntary minister of these mysteries. You see me here
to-night, for the hundredth time, bruised, defeated, broken, after
leaving the hallucinating sphere which surrounds that young girl, so
Seraphita |
