| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson: Why, in my father's house on Essen-Waterside, the fire and the
bright lights would show a mile away, and the door open to a
beggar's knock!
I came forward cautiously, and giving ear as I came, heard some
one rattling with dishes, and a little dry, eager cough that came
in fits; but there was no sound of speech, and not a dog barked.
The door, as well as I could see it in the dim light, was a great
piece of wood all studded with nails; and I lifted my hand with a
faint heart under my jacket, and knocked once. Then I stood and
waited. The house had fallen into a dead silence; a whole minute
passed away, and nothing stirred but the bats overhead. I
Kidnapped |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Hated Son by Honore de Balzac: Implacable as the war then going on between the Church and Calvinism,
the count's forehead was threatening even while he slept. Many
furrows, produced by the emotions of a warrior life, gave it a vague
resemblance to the vermiculated stone which we see in the buildings of
that period; his hair, like the whitish lichen of old oaks, gray
before its time, surrounded without grace a cruel brow, where
religious intolerance showed its passionate brutality. The shape of
the aquiline nose, which resembled the beak of a bird of prey, the
black and crinkled lids of the yellow eyes, the prominent bones of a
hollow face, the rigidity of the wrinkles, the disdain expressed in
the lower lip, were all expressive of ambition, despotism, and power,
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Frankenstein by Mary Shelley: to suppress his emotion; he placed his hands before his eyes, and
my voice quivered and failed me as I beheld tears trickle fast from
between his fingers; a groan burst from his heaving breast. I paused;
at length he spoke, in broken accents: "Unhappy man! Do you share
my madness? Have you drunk also of the intoxicating draught?
Hear me; let me reveal my tale, and you will dash the cup
from your lips!"
Such words, you may imagine, strongly excited my curiosity;
but the paroxysm of grief that had seized the stranger overcame
his weakened powers, and many hours of repose and tranquil
conversation were necessary to restore his composure.
Frankenstein |
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 Monster Men by Edgar Rice Burroughs: as those, you differ from them only in the symmetry of
your face and features, and the superior development of
your brain. There is no place in the world for them,
nor for you.
"I am sorry that it is so. I am sorry that I should
have to be the one to tell you; but it is better that
you know it now from a friend than that you meet the
bitter truth when you least expected it, and possibly
from the lips of one like Miss Maxon for whom you might
have formed a hopeless affection."
As von Horn spoke the expression on the young man's
The Monster Men |
