Today's Stichomancy for Rebecca Romijn
| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe: them their lives, and they humbly implored my mercy. But I told
them I knew not what mercy to show them; for as for myself, I had
resolved to quit the island with all my men, and had taken passage
with the captain to go to England; and as for the captain, he could
not carry them to England other than as prisoners in irons, to be
tried for mutiny and running away with the ship; the consequence of
which, they must needs know, would be the gallows; so that I could
not tell what was best for them, unless they had a mind to take
their fate in the island. If they desired that, as I had liberty
to leave the island, I had some inclination to give them their
lives, if they thought they could shift on shore. They seemed very
 Robinson Crusoe |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Poems by Bronte Sisters: "That mind my own. Oh! narrow cell;
Dark--imageless--a living tomb!
There must I sleep, there wake and dwell
Content, with palsy, pain, and gloom."
Again she paused; a moan of pain,
A stifled sob, alone was heard;
Long silence followed--then again
Her voice the stagnant midnight stirred.
"Must it be so? Is this my fate?
Can I nor struggle, nor contend?
And am I doomed for years to wait,
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Walden by Henry David Thoreau: and subjected to military law, I think that it is not too soon for
honest men to rebel and revolutionize. What makes this duty the
more urgent is the fact that the country so overrun is not our own,
but ours is the invading army.
Paley, a common authority with many on moral questions, in his
chapter on the "Duty of Submission to Civil Government," resolves
all civil obligation into expediency; and he proceeds to say that
"so long as the interest of the whole society requires it, that is,
so long as the established government cannot be resisted or changed
without public inconveniency, it is the will of God... that the
established government be obeyed, and no longer.... This principle
 Walden |
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 Plutarch's Lives by A. H. Clough: baker and his cook towards the place where he designed to stay
the next night; these went soberly and quietly into the town, in
which, if there happened to be no friend or acquaintance of Cato
or his family, they provided for him in an inn, and gave no
disturbance to anybody; but if there were no inn, then and in
this case only, they went to the magistrates, and desiring them
to help them to lodgings, took without complaint whatever was
allotted to them. His servants thus behaving themselves towards
the magistrates, without noise and threatening, were often
discredited, or neglected by them, so that Cato many times
arrived and found nothing provided for him. And it was all the
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