Today's Stichomancy for Oliver Stone

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from House of Mirth by Edith Wharton:

an assemblage of his kind he was not ridiculous-looking: a friendly critic might have called his heaviness weighty, and he was at his best in the attitude of vacant passivity which brings out the oddities of the restless. She fancied he was the kind of man whose sentimental associations would be stirred by the conventional imagery of a wedding, and she pictured herself, in the seclusion of the Van Osburgh conservatories, playing skillfully upon sensibilities thus prepared for her touch. In fact, when she looked at the other women about her, and recalled the image she had brought away from her own glass, it did not seem as though any special skill would be needed to repair her

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Confessio Amantis by John Gower:

And winne ayein here heritage. And thus thei ryde aboute faste To gete hem help, and ate laste Thei hadden pouer sufficant, And maden thanne a covenant, 1780 That thei ne scholden no lif save, Ne prest, ne clerc, ne lord, ne knave, Ne wif, ne child, of that thei finde, Which berth visage of mannes kinde, So that no lif schal be socoured, Bot with the dedly swerd devoured:

Confessio Amantis

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Rivers to the Sea by Sara Teasdale:

I am afraid of time.

Oh, gray bells cease your tolling, Time takes too much from me, And yet to rock and river He gives eternity.

Villa Serbelloni, Bellaggio

The fountain shivers lightly in the rain, The laurels drip, the fading roses fall,

RIVERS TO THE SEA

The marble satyr plays a mournful strain

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 Underground City by Jules Verne:

"That was a good work done, Mr. Ford," said he, a few days after his appointment. "You discovered a new field, and though you narrowly escaped paying for the discovery with your life-- well, it was not too dearly bought."

"No, Jack, it was a good bargain we made that time!" answered the old overman. "But neither Mr. Starr nor I have forgotten that to you we owe our lives."

"Not at all," returned Jack. "You owe them to your son Harry, when he had the good sense to accept my invitation to Irvine."

"And not to go, isn't that it?" interrupted Harry, grasping his comrade's hand. "No, Jack, it is to you, scarcely healed of your wounds--