| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Monster Men by Edgar Rice Burroughs: von Horn permitted them to draw nearer the shore,
though he continued to stand ready to thwart any
attempted treachery and warned both the professor
and Sing to be on guard.
As the prahu's nose touched the bank Muda Saffir
stepped aboard and with many protestations of gratitude
explained that he had fallen overboard from his own
prahu the night before and that evidently his followers
thought him drowned, since none of his boats had
returned to search for him. Scarcely had the Malay
seated himself before von Horn began questioning him
The Monster Men |
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 Timaeus by Plato: part of man was the more honourable and had authority. And they put in a
face in which they inserted organs to minister in all things to the
providence of the soul. They first contrived the eyes, into which they
conveyed a light akin to the light of day, making it flow through the
pupils. When the light of the eye is surrounded by the light of day, then
like falls upon like, and they unite and form one body which conveys to the
soul the motions of visible objects. But when the visual ray goes forth
into the darkness, then unlike falls upon unlike--the eye no longer sees,
and we go to sleep. The fire or light, when kept in by the eyelids,
equalizes the inward motions, and there is rest accompanied by few dreams;
only when the greater motions remain they engender in us corresponding
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