| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Koran: at times in the night celebrate them; and at the ends of the day;
haply thou mayest please (Him).
And do not strain after what we have provided a few of them with-the
flourish of the life of this world, to try them by; but the
provision of thy Lord is better and more lasting.
Bid thy people prayer, and persevere in it; we do not ask thee to
provide. We will provide, and the issue shall be to piety.
They say, 'Unless he bring us a sign from his Lord-What! has there
not come to them the manifest sign of what was in the pages of yore?'
But had we destroyed them with torment before it, they would have
said, 'Unless Thou hadst sent to us an apostle, that we might follow
The Koran |
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 End of the Tether by Joseph Conrad: fool enough not to make it at all. And yet, if his
chance to get on rested on the discovery of "something
wrong," he could not have hoped for a greater stroke
of luck.
X
The knowledge was too disturbing, really. There was
"something wrong" with a vengeance, and the moral
certitude of it was at first simply frightful to contem-
plate. Sterne had been looking aft in a mood so idle,
that for once he was thinking no harm of anyone. His
captain on the bridge presented himself naturally to
End of the Tether |
