| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Essays of Travel by Robert Louis Stevenson: as he tries to set forth his admiration in terms of what was then
permissible. The monstrous rocks, etc., says the Abbe 'sont admirees
avec surprise des voyageurs qui s'ecrient aussitot avec Horace: Ut
mihi devio rupee et vacuum nemus mirari libet.' The good man is not
exactly lyrical in his praise; and you see how he sets his back
against Horace as against a trusty oak. Horace, at any rate, was
classical. For the rest, however, the Abbe likes places where many
alleys meet; or which, like the Belle-Etoile, are kept up 'by a
special gardener,' and admires at the Table du Roi the labours of the
Grand Master of Woods and Waters, the Sieur de la Falure, 'qui a fait
faire ce magnifique endroit.'
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Tin Woodman of Oz by L. Frank Baum: a Yookoohoo than a Witch, and of course you know that
the Yookoohoos are the cleverest magic-workers in the
world."
The travelers were silent for a time, uneasily
considering this statement and the effect it might have
on their future. No doubt the Giantess had wilfully
made them her prisoners; yet she spoke so cheerfully,
in her big voice, that until now they had not been
alarmed in the least.
By and by the Scarecrow, whose mixed brains had been
working steadily, asked the woman:
The Tin Woodman of Oz |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Out of Time's Abyss by Edgar Rice Burroughs: horrid escort, pregnant with dire forebodings and with menace.
Though he advanced very slowly, he tried always to take steps of
about the same length; so that he knew that though considerable
time had elapsed, yet he had really advanced no more than four
hundred yards when ahead he saw a lessening of the pitch-darkness,
and at the next turn of the stream his surroundings became
vaguelydiscernible. Above him was an arched roof and on either
hand walls pierced at intervals by apertures covered with
wooden doors. Just ahead of him in the roof of the aqueduct
was a round, black hole about thirty inches in diameter.
His eyes still rested upon the opening when there shot downward
Out of Time's Abyss |
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 Shakespeare's Sonnets by William Shakespeare: Let them say more that like of hearsay well;
I will not praise that purpose not to sell.
XXII
My glass shall not persuade me I am old,
So long as youth and thou are of one date;
But when in thee time's furrows I behold,
Then look I death my days should expiate.
For all that beauty that doth cover thee,
Is but the seemly raiment of my heart,
Which in thy breast doth live, as thine in me:
How can I then be elder than thou art?
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