| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Herbert West: Reanimator by H. P. Lovecraft: and he betrayed his degenerating fibre by ordering the masonry
left intact and plastered over. Thus it remained till that final
hellish night; part of the walls of the secret laboratory. I speak
of West’s decadence, but must add that it was a purely mental
and intangible thing. Outwardly he was the same to the last --
calm, cold, slight, and yellow-haired, with spectacled blue eyes
and a general aspect of youth which years and fears seemed never
to change. He seemed calm even when he thought of that clawed
grave and looked over his shoulder; even when he thought of the
carnivorous thing that gnawed and pawed at Sefton bars.
The
Herbert West: Reanimator |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Collection of Antiquities by Honore de Balzac: of life by all the fibres of her being, still is conscious of the
communication, still vibrates with the shock of every trouble, and
thrills with every joy in the child's life as if it were her own. If
Nature has made of woman, physically speaking, a neutral ground, it
has not been forbidden to her, under certain conditions, to identify
herself completely with her offspring. When she has not merely given
life, but given of her whole life, you behold that wonderful,
unexplained, and inexplicable thing--the love of a woman for one of
her children above the others. The outcome of this story is one more
proof of a proven truth--a mother's place cannot be filled. A mother
foresees danger long before a Mlle. Armande can admit the possibility
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Letters from England by Elizabeth Davis Bancroft: miseries, tortures, and distresses, a sea voyage is the greatest . .
. The Liverpool paper this morning, after announcing our arrival
says: "The GREAT WESTERn, notwithstanding she encountered
throughout a series of most severe gales, accomplished the passage
in sixteen days and twelve hours."
To begin at the moment I left New York: I was so absorbed by the
pain of parting from you that I was in a state of complete apathy
with regard to all about me. I did not sentimentalize about "the
receding shores of my country;" I hardly looked at them, indeed.
Friday I was awoke in the middle of the night by the roaring of the
wind and sea and SUCH motion of the vessel.
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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 Battle of the Books by Jonathan Swift: them for the noblest ends. I visit, indeed, all the flowers and
blossoms of the field and garden, but whatever I collect thence
enriches myself without the least injury to their beauty, their
smell, or their taste. Now, for you and your skill in architecture
and other mathematics, I have little to say: in that building of
yours there might, for aught I know, have been labour and method
enough; but, by woeful experience for us both, it is too plain the
materials are naught; and I hope you will henceforth take warning,
and consider duration and matter, as well as method and art. You
boast, indeed, of being obliged to no other creature, but of
drawing and spinning out all from yourself; that is to say, if we
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