Today's Stichomancy for Akira Kurosawa

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Lily of the Valley by Honore de Balzac:

them old before their time. You must stay and rest here," he added, turning to me. "You are crushed by the avalanche of ideas that have rolled down upon you. What sort of future will this universal education bring upon us unless we prevent its evils by replacing public education in the hands of the religious bodies?"

These words were in harmony with a speech he afterwards made at the elections when he refused his support to a man whose gifts would have done good service to the royalist cause. "I shall always distrust men of talent," he said.

Presently the count proposed that we should make the tour of the gardens.

The Lily of the Valley

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Songs of Travel by Robert Louis Stevenson:

Her more lovely music Broods and dies.

O to mount again where erst I haunted; Where the old red hills are bird-enchanted, And the low green meadows Bright with sward; And when even dies, the million-tinted, And the night has come, and planets glinted, Lo, the valley hollow Lamp-bestarred!

O to dream, O to awake and wander

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Roads of Destiny by O. Henry:

rest.

"'Sarsaparilla,' says Perry.

"You could have knocked me down with a lemon peeling.

"'Insult me as much as you want to,' I says to Perry, 'but don't startle the bartender. He may have heart-disease. Come on, now; your tongue got twisted. The tall glasses,' I orders, 'and the bottle in the left-hand corner of the ice-chest.'

"'Sarsaparilla,' repeats Perry, and then his eyes get animated, and I see he's got some great scheme in his mind he wants to emit.

"'Buck,' says he, all interested, 'I'll tell you what! I want to make this a red-letter day. I've been keeping close at home, and I want to

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 De Profundis by Oscar Wilde:

The external things of life seem to me now of no importance at all. You can see to what intensity of individualism I have arrived - or am arriving rather, for the journey is long, and 'where I walk there are thorns.'

Of course I know that to ask alms on the highway is not to be my lot, and that if ever I lie in the cool grass at night-time it will be to write sonnets to the moon. When I go out of prison, R- will be waiting for me on the other side of the big iron-studded gate, and he is the symbol, not merely of his own affection, but of the affection of many others besides. I believe I am to have enough to live on for about eighteen months at any rate, so that if I may not