| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Othello by William Shakespeare: So opposite to Marriage, that she shun'd
The wealthy curled Deareling of our Nation,
Would euer haue (t' encurre a generall mocke)
Run from her Guardage to the sootie bosome,
Of such a thing as thou: to feare, not to delight?
Iudge me the world, if 'tis not grosse in sense,
That thou hast practis'd on her with foule Charmes,
Abus'd her delicate Youth, with Drugs or Minerals,
That weakens Motion. Ile haue't disputed on,
'Tis probable, and palpable to thinking;
I therefore apprehend and do attach thee,
Othello |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Shadow out of Time by H. P. Lovecraft: It was titled in the prevailing curvilinear hieroglyphs, though
something in the arrangement of the characters seemed subtly unusual.
The odd mechanism of the hooked fastener was perfectly well
known to me, and I snapped up the still rustless and workable
lid and drew out the book within. The latter, as expected, was
some twenty by fifteen inches in area, and two inches thick; the
thin metal covers opening at the top.
Its tough cellulose pages
seemed unaffected by the myriad cycles of time they had lived
through, and I studied the queerly pigmented, brush-drawn letters
of the text-symbols unlike either the usual curved hieroglyphs
Shadow out of Time |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Ballads by Robert Louis Stevenson: ballad. Even in a time of famine, it is probable that
Marquesan life went far more gaily than is here represented.
But the melancholy of to-day lies on the writer's mind.
TICONDEROGA
A LEGEND OF THE WEST HIGHLANDS
TICONDEROGA
THIS is the tale of the man
Who heard a word in the night
In the land of the heathery hills,
In the days of the feud and the fight.
By the sides of the rainy sea,
Ballads |
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 Bride of Lammermoor by Walter Scott: country."
"To be sure I do, or how could I help the old creatures when
they are in hard times? And as to Old Alice, she is the very
empress of old women and queen of gossips, so far as legendary
lore is concerned. She is blind, poor old soul, but when she
speaks to you, you would think she has some way of looking into
your very heart. I am sure I often cover my face, or turn it
away, for it seems as if she saw one change colour, though she
has been blind these twenty years. She is worth visiting, were
it but to say you have seen a blind and paralytic old woman have
so much acuteness of perception and dignity of manners. I assure
The Bride of Lammermoor |
