| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu by Sax Rohmer: the shoulders, and shuffled to the box which bore the smoky lamp.
Holding a needle in the flame, he dipped it, when red-hot, into an old
cocoa tin, and withdrew it with a bead of opium adhering to the end.
Slowly roasting this over the lamp, he dropped it into the bowl
of the metal pipe which he held ready, where it burned with a
spirituous blue flame.
"Pass it over," said Smith huskily, and rose on his knees with the assumed
eagerness of a slave to the drug.
Yan handed him the pipe, which he promptly put to his lips,
and prepared another for me.
"Whatever you do, don't inhale any," came Smith's whispered injunction.
The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Unseen World and Other Essays by John Fiske: bruised; and beside them Madonnas in royal habiliments, in gala
dresses of lustrous silk, adorned with diadems, precious
necklaces, bright ribbons, and elegant laces, with their cheeks
rosy, their eyes brilliant, their eyelashes sweeping. And by this
excess of literal imitation, there is awakened a feeling, not of
pleasure, but always of repugnance, often of disgust, and
sometimes of horror So in literature, the ancient Greek theatre,
and the best Spanish and English dramatists, alter on purpose the
natural current of human speech, and make their characters talk
under all the restraints of rhyme and rhythm. But we pronounce
this departure from literal truth a merit and not a defect. We
The Unseen World and Other Essays |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Before Adam by Jack London: fellow, wrinkled-faced and bleary-eyed and tottery. He
was legitimate prey. In our world there was no
sympathy between the kinds, and he was not our kind.
He was a Tree-Man, and he was very old. He was sitting
at the foot of a tree--evidently his tree, for we could
see the tattered nest in the branches, in which he
slept at night.
I pointed him out to Lop-Ear, and we made a rush for
him. He started to climb, but was too slow. I caught
him by the leg and dragged him back. Then we had fun.
We pinched him, pulled his hair, tweaked his ears, and
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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 Wrecker by Stevenson & Osbourne: wrote. "When the next allowance arrives, I shall go straight
out West, where you can do what you like with me."
It is to be understood that Pinkerton had been, in a sense,
pressing me to come from the beginning; depicting his isolation
among new acquaintances, "who have none of them your
culture," he wrote; expressing his friendship in terms so warm
that it sometimes embarrassed me to think how poorly I could
echo them; dwelling upon his need for assistance; and the next
moment turning about to commend my resolution and press me
to remain in Paris. "Only remember, Loudon," he would write,
"if you ever DO tire of it, there's plenty of work here for you
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