| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Hermione's Little Group of Serious Thinkers by Don Marquis: fore will happen again.
Only the question is whether the people to whom
it is happening again will know whether they
are the same people to whom it has happened
before.
That's where the question of Persistence of
Personal Identity comes in. FRIGHTFULLY fascinat-
ing, isn't it?
For my part I'd just as soon not be reincarnated
as to be reincarnated and not know anything about
it, wouldn't you?
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Danny's Own Story by Don Marquis: drove slow through the village and past our shop.
Hank come to the door of it as I went past. But
I hit them hosses a lick, and they broke into a right
smart trot. Elmira, she come onto the porch and
I waved my hand at her. She put her hand up to
her forehead to shut out the sun and jest stared.
She didn't know I was waving her farewell. Hank,
he yelled something at me, but I never hearn what.
I licked them hosses into a gallop and went around
the turn of the road. And that's the last I ever
seen or hearn of Hank or Elmira or that there little
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Deserted Woman by Honore de Balzac: youth of your being been mine, your sensitive, wholly gracious,
beautiful, and delicate youth? No woman shall find henceforth the
Gaston whom I have known, nor the delicious happiness that he has
given me. . . . No; you will never love again as you have loved,
as you love me now; no, I shall never have a rival, it is
impossible. There will be no bitterness in my memories of our
love, and I shall think of nothing else. It is out of your power
to enchant any woman henceforth by the childish provocations, the
charming ways of a young heart, the soul's winning charm, the
body's grace, the swift communion of rapture, the whole divine
cortege of young love, in fine.
|
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 Call of Cthulhu by H. P. Lovecraft: of all this - and of those hints of old Castro about the sunken,
star-born Old Ones and their coming reign; their faithful cult
and their mastery of dreams? Was I tottering on the brink of cosmic
horrors beyond man's power to bear? If so, they must be horrors
of the mind alone, for in some way the second of April had put
a stop to whatever monstrous menace had begun its siege of mankind's
soul.
That evening, after a day of hurried cabling and arranging,
I bade my host adieu and took a train for San Francisco. In less
than a month I was in Dunedin; where, however, I found that little
was known of the strange cult-members who had lingered in the
Call of Cthulhu |
