| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Miracle Mongers and Their Methods by Harry Houdini: you prepared yourself with phosphorus,
or will you take some of mine, which is
laid on that table?'' Mr. Smith, walked
up to the table, and pulling a vial bottle
out of his pocket, offered it to the poison-
swallower.
Fire-king--``I ask you, on your honor
as a gentleman, is this genuine unmixed
poison?''
Mr. Smith--``It is, upon my honor.''
Fire-king--``Is there any medical
Miracle Mongers and Their Methods |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Euthydemus by Plato: the Philebus; the true doctrine of contradiction is taught, and the fallacy
of arguing in a circle is exposed in the Republic; the nature of synthesis
and analysis is graphically described in the Phaedrus; the nature of words
is analysed in the Cratylus; the form of the syllogism is indicated in the
genealogical trees of the Sophist and Statesman; a true doctrine of
predication and an analysis of the sentence are given in the Sophist; the
different meanings of one and being are worked out in the Parmenides. Here
we have most of the important elements of logic, not yet systematized or
reduced to an art or science, but scattered up and down as they would
naturally occur in ordinary discourse. They are of little or no use or
significance to us; but because we have grown out of the need of them we
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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 Arrow of Gold by Joseph Conrad: I had thought it to be, or else that I had been altogether changed
sometime during the day, and that I was a different person from the
man whom I remembered getting out of my bed in the morning.
Also feelings had altered all their values. The words, too, had
become strange. It was only the inanimate surroundings that
remained what they had always been. For instance the studio. . . .
During my absence Senor Ortega had taken off his coat and I found
him as it were in the air, sitting in his shirt sleeves on a chair
which he had taken pains to place in the very middle of the floor.
I repressed an absurd impulse to walk round him as though he had
been some sort of exhibit. His hands were spread over his knees
The Arrow of Gold |
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 Pierrette by Honore de Balzac: the same restaurants, where, no doubt, the Rogrons chose it. Dinner
was served on white and gold china, with a dessert service of light
blue with green flowers, but they showed us another service in
earthenware for everyday use. Opposite to each sideboard was a large
cupboard containing linen. All was clean, new, and horribly sharp in
tone. However, I admit the dining-room; it has some character, though
disagreeable; it represents that of the masters of the house. But
there is no enduring the five engravings that hang on the walls; the
Minister of the Interior ought really to frame a law against them. One
was Poniatowski jumping into the Elster; the others, Napoleon pointing
a cannon, the defence at Clichy, and the two Mazepas, all in gilt
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