| 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: "Imagine a person, tall, lean and feline, high-shouldered, with a
brow like Shakespeare and a face like Satan, a close-shaven skull,
and long, magnetic eyes of the true cat-green. Invest him with all
the cruel cunning of an entire Eastern race, accumulated in one
giant intellect, with all the resources of science past and present,
with all the resources, if you will, of a wealthy government--
which, however, already has denied all knowledge of his existence.
Imagine that awful being, and you have a mental picture of Dr. Fu-Manchu,
the yellow peril incarnate in one man."
CHAPTER III
I SANK into an arm-chair in my rooms and gulped down a strong
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 Dark Lady of the Sonnets by George Bernard Shaw: SHAKESPEAR. _[sardonically]_ Ha!
THE DARK LADY. _[angrily]_ --ay, I'm as like to be saved as thou
that believest naught save some black magic of words and verses--I
say, madam, as I am a living woman I came here to break with him for
ever. Oh, madam, if you would know what misery is, listen to this man
that is more than man and less at the same time. He will tie you down
to anatomize your very soul: he will wring tears of blood from your
humiliation; and then he will heal the wound with flatteries that no
woman can resist.
SHAKESPEAR. Flatteries! _[Kneeling]_ Oh, madam, I put my case at
your royal feet. I confess to much. I have a rude tongue: I am
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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 Hamlet by William Shakespeare: To let them know both what we meane to do,
And what's vntimely done. Oh come away,
My soule is full of discord and dismay.
Exeunt.
Enter Hamlet.
Ham. Safely stowed
Gentlemen within. Hamlet, Lord Hamlet
Ham. What noise? Who cals on Hamlet?
Oh heere they come.
Enter Ros. and Guildensterne.
Ro. What haue you done my Lord with the dead body?
Hamlet |
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 Dark Lady of the Sonnets by George Bernard Shaw: expected to arise, that man is Frank Harris. Here is one who is
extraordinarily qualified, by a range of sympathy and understanding
that extends from the ribaldry of a buccaneer to the shyest
tendernesses of the most sensitive poetry, to be all things to all
men, yet whose proud humor it is to be to every man, provided the man
is eminent and pretentious, the champion of his enemies. To the
Archbishop he is an atheist, to the atheist a Catholic mystic, to the
Bismarckian Imperialist an Anacharsis Klootz, to Anacharsis Klootz a
Washington, to Mrs Proudie a Don Juan, to Aspasia a John Knox: in
short, to everyone his complement rather than his counterpart, his
antagonist rather than his fellow-creature. Always provided, however,
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