| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Shadow out of Time by H. P. Lovecraft: of natives and miners concerning the desert and its carven stones.
And yet I plodded on as if to some eldritch rendezvous - more
and more assailed by bewildering fancies, compulsions, and pseudo-memories.
I thought of some of the possible contours of the lines of stones
as seen by my son from the air, and wondered why they seemed at
once so ominous and so familiar. Something was fumbling and rattling
at the latch of my recollection, while another unknown force sought
to keep the portal barred.
The night was windless, and the pallid
sand curved upward and downward like frozen waves of the sea.
I had no goal, but somehow ploughed along as if with fate-bound
Shadow out of Time |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Macbeth by William Shakespeare: Of the rauin'd salt Sea sharke:
Roote of Hemlocke, digg'd i'th' darke:
Liuer of Blaspheming Iew,
Gall of Goate, and Slippes of Yew,
Sliuer'd in the Moones Ecclipse:
Nose of Turke, and Tartars lips:
Finger of Birth-strangled Babe,
Ditch-deliuer'd by a Drab,
Make the Grewell thicke, and slab.
Adde thereto a Tigers Chawdron,
For th' Ingredience of our Cawdron
Macbeth |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from A Voyage to Abyssinia by Father Lobo: blood to show that they partake in the revenge. It frequently
happens that the relations of the criminal are for taking the like
vengeance for his death, and sometimes pursue this resolution so far
that all those who had any share in the prosecution lose their
lives.
I being informed that these two men were to die, wrote to the
viceroy for his permission to exhort them, before they entered into
eternity, to unite themselves to the Church. My request being
granted, I applied myself to the men, and found one of them so
obstinate that he would not even afford me a hearing, and died in
his error. The other I found more flexible, and wrought upon him so
|
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 The Koran: they shall say, 'Yea, but ye did tempt yourselves, and did wait, and
did doubt; and your vain hopes beguiled you; and the beguiler beguiled
you about God.
'Wherefore to-day there shall not be taken from you a ransom, nor
from those who misbelieved. Your resort is the fire; it is your
sovereign, and an ill journey will it be!'
Is the time come to those who believe, for their hearts to be
humbled at the remembrance of God, and of what He has sent down in
truth? and for them not to be like those who were given the Scriptures
before, and over whom time was prolonged, but their hearts grew
hard, and many of them were workers of abomination?
The Koran |
