Today's Stichomancy for Galileo Galilei

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

are, we pull down everything and plant cabbages where marvels once were rife. Only yesterday the plough levelled Persan, that magnificent domain which gave a title to one of the most opulent families of the old parliament; hammers have demolished Montmorency, which cost an Italian follower of Napoleon untold sums; Val, the creation of Regnault de Saint-Jean d'Angely, Cassan, built by a mistress of the Prince de Conti; in all, four royal houses have disappeared in the valley of the Oise alone. We are getting a Roman campagna around Paris in advance of the days when a tempest shall blow from the north and overturn our plaster palaces and our pasteboard decorations.

Now see, my dear fellow, to what the habit of bombasticising in

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Herbert West: Reanimator by H. P. Lovecraft:

He had slowly tried to perfect a solution which, injected into the veins of the newly deceased, would restore life; a labour demanding an abundance of fresh corpses and therefore involving the most unnatural actions. Still more shocking were the products of some of the experiments -- grisly masses of flesh that had been dead, but that West waked to a blind, brainless, nauseous ammation. These were the usual results, for in order to reawaken the mind it was necessary to have specimens so absolutely fresh that no decay could possibly affect the delicate brain-cells.

This need for very fresh corpses had been West’s moral undoing. They were hard to get, and one awful day he had secured his specimen

Herbert West: Reanimator

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The White Moll by Frank L. Packard:

care of him for a couple of years; an' back here the old woman got kind of feeble an' on her uppers, an there was hell to pay, an' -"

"Wot's bitin' youse, Nan?" The Pug's lisping whisper broke sharply in upon Pinkie Bonn's story.

Rhoda Gray started. She was conscious now that she had been leaning forward, staring in a startled way at Pinkie as he talked; conscious now that for a moment she had forgotten - that she was Gypsy Nan. But she was mistress of herself on the instant, and she scowled blackly at the Pug.

"Mabbe it's me soft heart dat's touched!" she flung out acidly. "Youse close yer trap, an' let Pinkie talk!"

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 Vision Splendid by William MacLeod Raine:

This man was a worker. He would not annoy her or interfere with her careless pleasures. Again she asked herself, Why not?

"I suppose you really do like me." Her face was tilted in gay little appeal.

"I'm not going to tell you how much. It wouldn't be good for discipline in the house."

Her soft little laugh bubbled over. "We seem to have quite settled it. And I hadn't the slightest notion of agreeing to anything so ridiculous when I ventured that indiscreet remark about an abduction." She looked up at him with smiling insolence. "You're only an adventurer, you know. I daresay you haven't even paid for