| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Island of Doctor Moreau by H. G. Wells: "May I not come near you?" it said.
"No; go away," I insisted, and snapped my whip. Then putting
my whip in my teeth, I stooped for a stone, and with that threat
drove the creature away.
So in solitude I came round by the ravine of the Beast People,
and hiding among the weeds and reeds that separated this
crevice from the sea I watched such of them as appeared,
trying to judge from their gestures and appearance how the death
of Moreau and Montgomery and the destruction of the House of Pain
had affected them. I know now the folly of my cowardice.
Had I kept my courage up to the level of the dawn, had I not
The Island of Doctor Moreau |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Menexenus by Plato: have an inferior degree of evidence in their favour. They may have been
supposed by him to be the writings of another, although in the case of
really great works, e.g. the Phaedo, this is not credible; those again
which are quoted but not named, are still more defective in their external
credentials. There may be also a possibility that Aristotle was mistaken,
or may have confused the master and his scholars in the case of a short
writing; but this is inconceivable about a more important work, e.g. the
Laws, especially when we remember that he was living at Athens, and a
frequenter of the groves of the Academy, during the last twenty years of
Plato's life. Nor must we forget that in all his numerous citations from
the Platonic writings he never attributes any passage found in the extant
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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 Glasses by Henry James: made--Mrs. Meldrum had herself seen the letter--a "handsome" offer
of pecuniary compensation. Oh if Flora, with her incredible
buoyancy, was in a manner on her feet again now it was not that she
had not for weeks and weeks been prone in the dust. Strange were
the humiliations, the forms of anguish, it was given some natures
to survive. That Flora had survived was perhaps after all a proof
she was reserved for some final mercy. "But she has been in the
abysses at any rate," said Mrs. Meldrum, "and I really don't think
I can tell you what pulled her through."
"I think I can tell YOU," I returned. "What in the world but Mrs.
Meldrum?"
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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 Battle of the Books by Jonathan Swift: and low church, of Whig and Tory, Presbyterian and Church of
England, which are now so many mutual clogs upon public
proceedings, and are apt to prefer the gratifying themselves or
depressing their adversaries before the most important interest of
the State.
I confess, if it were certain that so great an advantage would
redound to the nation by this expedient, I would submit, and be
silent; but will any man say, that if the words, whoring, drinking,
cheating, lying, stealing, were, by Act of Parliament, ejected out
of the English tongue and dictionaries, we should all awake next
morning chaste and temperate, honest and just, and lovers of truth?
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