| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare: Lis. Faire loue, you faint with wandring in y woods,
And to speake troth I haue forgot our way:
Wee'll rest vs Hermia, If you thinke it good,
And tarry for the comfort of the day
Her. Be it so Lysander; finde you out a bed,
For I vpon this banke will rest my head
Lys. One turfe shall serue as pillow for vs both,
One heart, one bed, two bosomes, and one troth
Her. Nay good Lysander, for my sake my deere
Lie further off yet, doe not lie so neere
Lys. O take the sence sweet, of my innocence,
A Midsummer Night's Dream |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from On Horsemanship by Xenophon: himself, life and limb, to the safe keeping of his horse.
[1] Lit. "To proceed: when you have bought a horse which you admire
and have brought him home."
[2] i.e. "where he will be brought as frequently as possible under the
master's eye." Cf. "Econ." xii. 20.
Nor is it only to avoid the risk of food being stolen that a secure
horse-box is desirable, but for the further reason that if the horse
takes to scattering his food, the action is at once detected; and any
one who observes that happening may take it as a sign and symptom
either of too much blood,[3] which calls for veterinary aid, or of
over-fatigue, for which rest is the cure, or else that an attack of
On Horsemanship |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Works of Samuel Johnson by Samuel Johnson: and was not without hopes that fame might be
purchased by a few broken bones without the toil of
thinking; but having been shattered by some violent
experiments, and constrained to confine myself to
my books, I passed six and thirty years in searching
the treasures of ancient wisdom, but am at last amply
recompensed for all my perseverance.
The curiosity of the present race of philosophers,
having been long exercised upon electricity, has been
lately transformed to magnetism; the qualities of
the loadstone have been investigated, if not with
|
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 At the Mountains of Madness by H. P. Lovecraft: we knew that the swiftness of the Old Ones would enable any scream-roused
and pursuing survivor of the slaughter to overtake us in a moment
if it really wished to do so. We had a vague hope, however, that
nonaggressive conduct and a display of kindred reason might cause
such a being to spare us in case of capture, if only from scientific
curiosity. Alter all, if such an one had nothing to fear for itself,
it would have no motive in harming us. Concealment being futile
at this juncture, we used our torch for a running glance behind,
and perceived that the mist was thinning. Would we see, at last,
a complete and living specimen of those others? Again came that
insidious musical piping- "Tekeli-li! Tekeli-li!" Then, noting
At the Mountains of Madness |
