The Call of Cthullu

[Andrew]

I love the first paragraph of this story:

"The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its
contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was
not meant that we should voyage far. The sciences, each straining in its own direction, have
hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up
such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from
the revelation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age."

[Andrew]

if anyone is wondering what bas-relief is here is a definition:

Definition:

A French term from the Italian basso-relievo ("low relief"), bas relief is a sculpture technique in which figures and/or other design elements are just barely more prominent than the (overall flat) background.

Bas relief is created either by carving away material (wood, stone, ivory, jade, etc.) or adding material to the top of an otherwise smooth surface (say, strips of clay to stone).

This is a technique as old as humankind's artistic explorations, and is closely related to high relief.