| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Tao Teh King by Lao-tze: Its firmest virtue seems but poor and low;
Its solid truth seems change to undergo;
Its largest square doth yet no corner show
A vessel great, it is the slowest made;
Loud is its sound, but never word it said;
A semblance great, the shadow of a shade.'
3. The Tao is hidden, and has no name; but it is the Tao which is
skilful at imparting (to all things what they need) and making them
complete.
42. 1. The Tao produced One; One produced Two; Two produced Three;
Three produced All things. All things leave behind them the Obscurity
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom by William and Ellen Craft: out him."
"You will have to get on without him if you
take him to the North," continued this man; "for
I can tell ye, stranger, as a friend, I am an older
cove than you, I have seen lots of this ere world,
and I reckon I have had more dealings with niggers
than any man living or dead. I was once employed
by General Wade Hampton, for ten years, in doing
nothing but breaking 'em in; and everybody knows
that the General would not have a man that didn't
understand his business. So I tell ye, stranger,
Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Great God Pan by Arthur Machen: the first to show me the way, though I don't think he ever found
it himself. That is a strange saying of his: 'In every grain of
wheat there lies hidden the soul of a star.'"
There was not much furniture in the laboratory. The
table in the centre, a stone slab with a drain in one corner,
the two armchairs on which Raymond and Clarke were sitting; that
was all, except an odd-looking chair at the furthest end of the
room. Clarke looked at it, and raised his eyebrows.
"Yes, that is the chair," said Raymond. "We may as
well place it in position." He got up and wheeled the chair to
the light, and began raising and lowering it, letting down the
The Great God Pan |
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 Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce: The two definitions immediately foregoing are condensed from the
works of one thousand eminent scientists, who have illuminated the
subject with a great white light, to the inexpressible advancement of
human knowledge.
MAGNIFICENT, adj. Having a grandeur or splendor superior to that to
which the spectator is accustomed, as the ears of an ass, to a rabbit,
or the glory of a glowworm, to a maggot.
MAGNITUDE, n. Size. Magnitude being purely relative, nothing is
large and nothing small. If everything in the universe were increased
in bulk one thousand diameters nothing would be any larger than it was
before, but if one thing remain unchanged all the others would be
The Devil's Dictionary |
