| 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: increasing radiance, each dragon, I thought, intertwined its
glittering coils more closely with those of another.
The carpet was of such richness that I stood knee-deep in its pile.
And this, too, was fashioned all over with golden dragons; and they
seemed to glide about amid the shadows of the design--stealthily.
At the farther end of the hall--for hall it was--a huge table
with dragons' legs stood solitary amid the luxuriance of the carpet.
It bore scintillating globes, and tubes that held living organisms,
and books of a size and in such bindings as I never had imagined,
with instruments of a type unknown to Western science--a heterogeneous
litter quite indescribable, which overflowed on to the floor,
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 Historical Lecturers and Essays by Charles Kingsley: believe, the human race sprang from a single pair, there must have
been among their individual descendants an equality far greater than
any which has been known on earth during historic times. But that
equality was at best the infantile innocence of the primary race,
which faded away in the race as quickly, alas! as it does in the
individual child. Divine--therefore it was one of the first
blessings which man lost; one of the last, I fear, to which he will
return; that to which civilisation, even at its best yet known, has
not yet attained, save here and there for short periods; but towards
which it is striving as an ideal goal, and, as I trust, not in vain.
The eldest of things which we see actually as history is not
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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 Concerning Christian Liberty by Martin Luther: you well; for if Bernard felt compassion for his Anastasius at a
time when the Roman see, though even then most corrupt, was as
yet ruling with better hope than now, why should not we lament,
to whom so much further corruption and ruin has been added in
three hundred years?
Is it not true that there is nothing under the vast heavens more
corrupt, more pestilential, more hateful, than the Court of Rome?
She incomparably surpasses the impiety of the Turks, so that in
very truth she, who was formerly the gate of heaven, is now a
sort of open mouth of hell, and such a mouth as, under the urgent
wrath of God, cannot be blocked up; one course alone being left
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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 Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton by Edith Wharton: thought you understood that where I come from we don't do that
kind of thing--knowingly."
"But, sir, to serve a young lady!"
"I'm sorry for the young lady, if what you tell me is true"--the
Count's expressive hands resented the doubt--"but remember that
if I am under obligations to any one in this matter, it is to her
father, who has admitted me to his house and has allowed me to
see his picture."
"HIS picture? Hers!"
"Well, the house is his, at all events."
"Unhappily--since to her it is a dungeon!"
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