| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Alkahest by Honore de Balzac: the crack was instantly filled up. The sashes, the sills, the copings,
were dusted oftener than the most precious sculptures in the Louvre.
The front of the house bore no signs of decay; notwithstanding the
deepened color which age had given to the bricks, it was as well
preserved as a choice old picture, or some rare book cherished by an
amateur, which would be ever new were it not for the blistering of our
climate and the effect of gases, whose pernicious breath threatens our
own health.
The cloudy skies and humid atmosphere of Flanders, and the shadows
produced by the narrowness of the street, sometimes diminished the
brilliancy which the old house derived from its cleanliness; moreover,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Weir of Hermiston by Robert Louis Stevenson: and he should behold for ever, Christina perched on the same tomb, in
the grey colours of the evening, gracious, dainty, perfect as a flower,
and she also singing-
"Of old, unhappy far off things,
And battles long ago,"
of their common ancestors now dead, of their rude wars composed, their
weapons buried with them, and of these strange changelings, their
descendants, who lingered a little in their places, and would soon be
gone also, and perhaps sung of by others at the gloaming hour. By one
of the unconscious arts of tenderness the two women were enshrined
together in his memory. Tears, in that hour of sensibility, came into
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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 At the Mountains of Madness by H. P. Lovecraft: we had escaped damage through the skill of Atwood in devising
rudimentary aeroplane shelters and windbreaks of heavy snow blocks,
and reinforcing the principal camp buildings with snow. Our good
luck and efficiency had indeed been almost uncanny.
The outside
world knew, of course, of our program, and was told also of Lake’s
strange and dogged insistence on a westward - or rather, northwestward
- prospecting trip before our radical shift to the new base. It
seems that he had pondered a great deal, and with alarmingly radical
daring, over that triangular striated marking in the slate; reading
into it certain contradictions in nature and geological period
At the Mountains of Madness |
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 A Footnote to History by Robert Louis Stevenson: himself on proclamations, which it does not follow that any one
will heed. He can summon parliaments; it does not follow they will
assemble. If he be too flagrantly disobeyed, he can go to war.
But so he could before, when he was only the chief of certain
provinces. His own provinces will support him, the provinces of
his rivals will take the field upon the other part; just as before.
In so far as he is the holder of any of the five NAMES, in short,
he is a man to be reckoned with; in so far as he is king of Samoa,
I cannot find but what the president of a college debating society
is a far more formidable officer. And unfortunately, although the
credit side of the account proves thus imaginary, the debit side is
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