| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Lost Continent by Edgar Rice Burroughs: across a narrow neck of land that saved us many miles, where
the river wound to the west and back again.
Here we decided to halt, for we had had a hard day of it,
and, if the truth were known, I think that we had all given
up hope of overtaking the launch other than by the merest
accident.
We had shot a deer just before our halt, and, as Taylor and
Delcarte were preparing it, I walked down to the water to
fill our canteens. I had just finished, and was
straightening up, when something floating around a bend
above me caught my eye. For a moment I could not believe
Lost Continent |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Timaeus by Plato: modes of explaining and arranging phenomena, he is unwilling to give up any
of them, though he is unable to unite them in a consistent whole.
Lastly, Plato, though an idealist philosopher, is Greek and not Oriental in
spirit and feeling. He is no mystic or ascetic; he is not seeking in vain
to get rid of matter or to find absorption in the divine nature, or in the
Soul of the universe. And therefore we are not surprised to find that his
philosophy in the Timaeus returns at last to a worship of the heavens, and
that to him, as to other Greeks, nature, though containing a remnant of
evil, is still glorious and divine. He takes away or drops the veil of
mythology, and presents her to us in what appears to him to be the form-
fairer and truer far--of mathematical figures. It is this element in the
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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 The Chessmen of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs: depend upon this panthan not only for protection but for
companionship as well. She missed him, and in missing him
realized suddenly that he had meant more to her than a mere hired
warrior. It was as though a friend had been taken from her--an
old and valued friend. She rose from her place of concealment
that she might have a better view of the city.
U-Dor, dwar of the 8th Utan of O-Tar, Jeddak of Manator, rode
back in the early dawn toward Manator from a brief excursion to a
neighboring village. As he was rounding the hills south of the
city, his keen eyes were attracted by a slight movement among the
shrubbery close to the summit of the nearest hill. He halted his
The Chessmen of Mars |
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 A Distinguished Provincial at Paris by Honore de Balzac: "My reasons for the change are based on lofty grounds; the end will
justify the means," said Lucien.
"Perhaps you do not fully comprehend our position on the side of the
Government," said Leon Giraud. "The Government, the Court, the
Bourbons, the Absolutist Party, or to sum up in the general
expression, the whole system opposed to the constitutional system, may
be divided upon the question of the best means of extinguishing the
Revolution, but is unanimous as to the advisability of extinguishing
the newspapers. The Reveil, the Foudre, and the Drapeau Blanc have all
been founded for the express purpose of replying to the slander,
gibes, and railing of the Liberal press. I cannot approve them, for it
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