| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Pellucidar by Edgar Rice Burroughs: We made our way steadily down the rim of the beau-
tiful river which flows the length of the island, coming
at last to a wood rather denser than any that I had be-
fore encountered in this country. Well within this forest
my escort halted.
"There!" they said, and pointed ahead. "We are to go
no farther."
Thus having guided me to my destination they left
me. Ahead of me, through the trees, I could see what
appeared to be the foot of a steep hill. Toward this I
made my way. The forest ran to the very base of a cliff,
Pellucidar |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Voyage of the Beagle by Charles Darwin: pears, figs, peaches, apricots, grapes, olives, gooseberries,
currants, hops, gorse for fences, and English oaks; also many
kinds of flowers. Around the farm-yard there were stables,
a thrashing-barn with its winnowing machine, a blacksmith's
forge, and on the ground ploughshares and other tools: in
the middle was that happy mixture of pigs and poultry, lying
comfortably together, as in every English farm-yard. At the
distance of a few hundred yards, where the water of a little
rill had been dammed up into a pool, there was a large and
substantial water-mill.
All this is very surprising, when it is considered that five
The Voyage of the Beagle |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Profits of Religion by Upton Sinclair: of England in Whitaker's Almanac; it appears that there are 40 of
these functionaries, including the archbishops, but not the
suffragans; and that the total salary paid to them amounts to
more than nine hundred thousand dollars a year. This, it should
be understood, does not include the pay of their assistants, nor
the cost of maintaining their religious establishments; it does
not include any private incomes which they or their wives may
possess, as members of the privileged classes of the Empire. I
look up their ages in Who's Who, and I find that there is only
one below fifty-three; the oldest of them is ninety-one, while
the average age of the goodly company is seventy. There have been
|
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 Warlord of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs:
Her position beside the Jeddak of Jeddaks boded ill for her and me,
and on the instant that I saw her there, there sprang to my mind
the firm intention never to leave that chamber alive if I must
leave her in the clutches of this powerful tyrant.
I had killed better men than Salensus Oll, and killed them
with my bare hands, and now I swore to myself that I should kill
him if I found that the only way to save the Princess of Helium.
That it would mean almost instant death for me I cared not, except
that it would remove me from further efforts in behalf of Dejah
The Warlord of Mars |
