| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Allan Quatermain by H. Rider Haggard: it. The first is that the name owes its origin to the great
quantity of gold that is found in the land. Indeed, in this
respect Zu-Vendis is a veritable Eldorado, the precious metal
being extraordinarily plentiful. At present it is collected
from purely alluvial diggings, which we subsequently inspected,
and which are situated within a day's journey from Milosis, being
mostly found in pockets and in nuggets weighing from an ounce
up to six or seven pounds in weight. But other diggings of a
similar nature are known to exist, and I have besides seen great
veins of gold-bearing quartz. In Zu-Vendis gold is a much commoner
metal than silver, and thus it has curiously enough come to pass
Allan Quatermain |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Theaetetus by Plato: know the original principle on which the doctrine of Protagoras is based?'
'No.' 'Then I will tell you; but we must not let the uninitiated hear, and
by the uninitiated I mean the obstinate people who believe in nothing which
they cannot hold in their hands. The brethren whose mysteries I am about
to unfold to you are far more ingenious. They maintain that all is motion;
and that motion has two forms, action and passion, out of which endless
phenomena are created, also in two forms--sense and the object of sense--
which come to the birth together. There are two kinds of motions, a slow
and a fast; the motions of the agent and the patient are slower, because
they move and create in and about themselves, but the things which are born
of them have a swifter motion, and pass rapidly from place to place. The
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