| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Lair of the White Worm by Bram Stoker: a clever, unscrupulous rogue, and he felt that with things moving
round him in this great household there should be opportunities of
self-advancement. Being unscrupulous and stealthy--and a savage--he
looked to dishonest means. He saw plainly enough that Lady Arabella
was making a dead set at his master, and he was watchful of the
slightest sign of anything which might enhance this knowledge. Like
the other men in the house, he knew of the carrying to and fro of
the great chest, and had got it into his head that the care
exercised in its porterage indicated that it was full of treasure.
He was for ever lurking around the turret-rooms on the chance of
making some useful discovery. But he was as cautious as he was
Lair of the White Worm |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Barlaam and Ioasaph by St. John of Damascus: a God, who is good and a lover of mankind, who commandeth
righteousness, enjoineth continency, ordaineth chastity, teacheth
mercy, giveth faith, preacheth peace; who is called and is
himself the very truth, the very love, the very goodness. Him
were it not better to worship than thy gods of many evil
passions, of shameful names and shameful lives? Woe unto you
that are more stony-hearted than the stones, and more senseless
than the senseless, sons of perdition, inheritors of darkness!
But blessed am I, and all Christian folk, having a good God and a
lover of mankind! They that serve him, though, for a season in
this life they endure evil, yet shall they reap the immortal
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