| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from When the Sleeper Wakes by H. G. Wells: snatches the beat and impulse of the revolutionary
song. He saw through a gap in the people that a thick
stream of heads still poured up the stairway. "The
Master is coming," shouted voices, "the Master is
coming," and the crowd about him grew denser and
denser. He began to thrust himself towards the
central groove. "The Master is coming!" "The Sleeper,
the Master!" "God and the Master!" roared the
Voices.
And suddenly quite close to him were the black uniforms o
f the revolutionary guard, and for the first and
When the Sleeper Wakes |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Egmont by Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe: contingency, and firmly resolved in my own mind what, in that case, was
to be done; and now, when I am called upon to act, I can with difficulty
guard my mind from being again distracted by conflicting doubts. Is it
expedient to seize the others if he escape me? Shall I delay, and suffer
Egmont to elude my grasp, together with his friends, and so many others
who now, and perhaps for to-day only, are in my hands? How! Does
destiny control even thee--the uncontrollable? How long matured! How
well prepared! How great, how admirable the plan! How nearly had hope
attained the goal! And now, at the decisive moment, thou art placed
between two evils; as in a lottery, thou dost grasp in the dark future; what
thou hast drawn remains still unrolled, to thee unknown whether it is a
Egmont |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Dead Souls by Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol: "Your Highness, which of us is altogether beyond reproach? The
tchinovniks of our town are human beings, and no more. Some of them
are men of worth, and nearly all of them men skilled in
business--though also, unfortunately, largely inter-related."
"Now, tell me this, Athanasi Vassilievitch," said the Prince, "for you
are about the only honest man of my acquaintance. What has inspired in
you such a penchant for defending rascals?"
"This," replied Murazov. "Take any man you like of the persons whom
you thus term rascals. That man none the less remains a human being.
That being so, how can one refuse to defend him when all the time one
knows that half his errors have been committed through ignorance and
Dead Souls |
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 Court Life in China by Isaac Taylor Headland: appointing him a secretary of the Foreign Office, and
subsequently ordered him to Shanghai to direct the management of
the official newspaper there. Instead of this, however, he dared
to remain in Peking pursuing his nefarious designs against the
dynasty, and had it not been for the protection given by the
spirits of our ancestors he certainly would have succeeded. Kang
Yu-wei is therefore the arch conspirator, and his chief
assistant is Liang Chi-tsao, M. A., and they are both to be
immediately arrested and punished for the crime of rebellion. The
other principal conspirators, namely, the Censor Yang Shen-hsin,
Kang Kuang-jen--the brother of Kang Yu-wei--and the four
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