| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Iliad by Homer: once victorious, so mightily did Minerva help him. The Cadmeans
were incensed at his success, and set a force of fifty youths
with two captains--the godlike hero Maeon, son of Haemon, and
Polyphontes, son of Autophonus--at their head, to lie in wait for
him on his return journey; but Tydeus slew every man of them,
save only Maeon, whom he let go in obedience to heaven's omens.
Such was Tydeus of Aetolia. His son can talk more glibly, but he
cannot fight as his father did."
Diomed made no answer, for he was shamed by the rebuke of
Agamemnon; but the son of Capaneus took up his words and said,
"Son of Atreus, tell no lies, for you can speak truth if you
The Iliad |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Moby Dick by Herman Melville: sailor should sleep two in a bed, more than anybody else; for sailors
no more sleep two in a bed at sea, than bachelor Kings do ashore. To
be sure they all sleep together in one apartment, but you have your
own hammock, and cover yourself with your own blanket, and sleep in
your own skin.
The more I pondered over this harpooneer, the more I abominated the
thought of sleeping with him. It was fair to presume that being a
harpooneer, his linen or woollen, as the case might be, would not be
of the tidiest, certainly none of the finest. I began to twitch all
over. Besides, it was getting late, and my decent harpooneer ought
to be home and going bedwards. Suppose now, he should tumble in upon
Moby Dick |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from When the World Shook by H. Rider Haggard: for a while in his short-sighted way, then said: "Do you know,
Arbuthnot, it has sometimes occurred to me, and never more than
at this moment, that although they were different in height and
so on, there was a really curious physical resemblance between
your late wife and the Lady Yva."
"Yes," I answered. "I think so too."
Bickley also examined the portrait very carefully, and as he
did so I saw him start. Then he turned away, saying nothing.
Such is the summary of all that has been important in my life.
It is, I admit, an odd story and one which suggests problems that
I cannot solve. Bastin deals with such things by that acceptance
When the World Shook |
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 Louis Lambert by Honore de Balzac: their laws, accounted for a multitude of phenomena which, till then,
had been regarded with reason as incomprehensible. Thus wizards, men
possessed with second sight, and demoniacs of every degree--the
victims of the Middle Ages--became the subject of explanations so
natural, that their very simplicity often seemed to me the seal of
their truth. The marvelous gifts which the Church of Rome, jealous of
all mysteries, punished with the stake, were, in Louis' opinion, the
result of certain affinities between the constituent elements of
matter and those of mind, which proceed from the same source. The man
holding a hazel rod when he found a spring of water was guided by some
antipathy or sympathy of which he was unconscious; nothing but the
Louis Lambert |
