| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Lamentable Tragedy of Locrine and Mucedorus by William Shakespeare: I promise ye.
MUCEDORUS.
But where shall I find you in the Court?
MOUSE.
Why, where it is best being, either in the kitchen a
eating or in the buttery drinking: but if you come, I
will provide for thee a piece of beef & brewis knockle
deep in fat; pray you, take pains, remember master
mouse.
[Exit.]
MUCEDORUS.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Madam How and Lady Why by Charles Kingsley: the north of France.
So it seems as if these lines of volcanos stood along cracks in
the rind of the earth, through which the melted stuff inside was
for ever trying to force its way; and that, as the crack got
stopped up in one place by the melted stuff cooling and hardening
again into stone, it was burst in another place, and a fresh
volcano made, or an old one re-opened.
Now we can understand why earthquakes should be most common round
volcanos; and we can understand, too, why they would be worst
before a volcano breaks out, because then the steam is trying to
escape; and we can understand, too, why people who live near
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Prince Otto by Robert Louis Stevenson: CHAPTER XIV - RELATES THE CAUSE AND OUTBREAK OF THE REVOLUTION
BRAVE as she was, and brave by intellect, the Princess, when first
she was alone, clung to the table for support. The four corners of
her universe had fallen. She had never liked nor trusted Gondremark
completely; she had still held it possible to find him false to
friendship; but from that to finding him devoid of all those public
virtues for which she had honoured him, a mere commonplace
intriguer, using her for his own ends, the step was wide and the
descent giddy. Light and darkness succeeded each other in her
brain; now she believed, and now she could not. She turned, blindly
groping for the note. But von Rosen, who had not forgotten to take
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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 When the World Shook by H. Rider Haggard: blood go dancing through our veins as though the draught had been
some nectar of the gods. Then, having extinguished the lanterns
which we still carried, for here they were needless, and we
wished to save our oil, we followed her through the great doors
into the vast hall of audience and advanced up it between the
endless, empty seats. At its head, on the dais beneath the
arching shell, sat Oro on his throne. As before, he wore the
jewelled cap and the gorgeous, flowing robes, while the table in
front of him was still strewn with sheets of metal on which he
wrote with a pen, or stylus, that glittered like a diamond or his
own fierce eyes. Then he lifted his head and beckoned to us to
When the World Shook |
