Today's Stichomancy for Leonardo da Vinci

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Poems by Bronte Sisters:

Cold in the earth--and fifteen wild Decembers, From those brown hills, have melted into spring: Faithful, indeed, is the spirit that remembers After such years of change and suffering!

Sweet Love of youth, forgive, if I forget thee, While the world's tide is bearing me along; Other desires and other hopes beset me, Hopes which obscure, but cannot do thee wrong!

No later light has lightened up my heaven, No second morn has ever shone for me; All my life's bliss from thy dear life was given,

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Sportsman by Xenophon:

each over her own offspring. The huntsman, who has seen it all,[11] will loose the dogs, and with javelins in hand himself advance towards the nearest fawn in the direction of where he saw it laid to rest; carefully noting the lie of the land,[12] for fear of making some mistake; since the place itself will present a very different aspect on approach from what it looked like at a distance.

[4] See above, v. 14. I do not know that any one has answered Schneider's question: Quidni sensum eundem servavit homo religiosus in hinnulis?

[5] "The fawns (of the roe deer) are born in the spring, usually early in May," Lydekker, "R. N. H." ii. p. 383; of the red deer

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Royalty Restored/London Under Charles II by J. Fitzgerald Molloy:

the daring manner in which his abduction had been effected. On this an alarm was immediately raised, and the porter, servants, and others hastened down Piccadilly in search of their master, fast as good horses could carry them.

They had proceeded as far as the village of Knightsbridge, when reports of muskets, cries for help, and sounds of a scuffle they could not see for darkness, fell upon their ears, and filled them with alarm. The whole neighbourhood seemed startled, lights flashed, dogs barked, and many persons rushed towards the scene of encounter. Aware of this, the miscreants who had carried off the duke discharged their pistols at him, and leaving him, as

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 Divine Comedy (translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) by Dante Alighieri:

Our Lord demanded of Saint Peter first, Before he put the keys into his keeping? Truly he nothing asked but 'Follow me.'

Nor Peter nor the rest asked of Matthias Silver or gold, when he by lot was chosen Unto the place the guilty soul had lost.

Therefore stay here, for thou art justly punished, And keep safe guard o'er the ill-gotten money, Which caused thee to be valiant against Charles.

And were it not that still forbids it me The reverence for the keys superlative

The Divine Comedy (translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow)