Today's Stichomancy for The Rock

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Blix by Frank Norris:

faint and weak with laughter. "Oh, well," he exclaimed aggrievedly--"laugh, that's right! I don't laugh. It isn't such fun when you've got 'em yoursel'-- HULP." "But sit down, for goodness' sake! You make me so nervous. You can't walk them off. Sit down and hold your breath while you count nine. Condy, I'm going to take off my gloves and veil. What do you think?"

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Manon Lescaut by Abbe Prevost:

abode,' he said, 'it must no longer be called the Magdalen; it is Versailles! now that it contains a person who deserves the empire of all hearts.'

"I made the man who attended a present as I went out, in order to quicken his zeal and attentions. This fellow had a mind less rough and vulgar than the generality of his class. He had witnessed our interview, and was affected by it. The interest he felt was doubtless increased by the louis d'or I gave him. He took me aside as we went down into the courtyard. `Sir,' said he, `if you will only take me into your service, or indemnify me in any way for the loss of the situation which I fill here, I

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Common Sense by Thomas Paine:

of any ship last war, yet had not twenty sailors on board, though her complement of men was upwards of two hundred. A few able and social sailors will soon instruct a sufficient number of active landmen in the common work of a ship. Wherefore, we never can be more capable to begin on maritime matters than now, while our timber is standing, our fisheries blocked up, and our sailors and shipwrights out of employ. Men of war of seventy and eighty guns were built forty years ago in New-England, and why not the same now? Ship-building is America's greatest pride, and in which she will in time excel the whole world. The great empires of the east are mostly inland,

Common Sense

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 Bickerstaff-Partridge Papers by Jonathan Swift:

cavaliers; princes and nobles appear in night-rails and petticoats; men shall squeak upon theatres with female voices, and women corrupt virgins; lords shall knot and cut paper; and even the northern people.........:" A Greek phrase (which for modesty's sake I forbear to translate) which denotes a vice too frequent amongst us.

That the Ministry foresaw this great change, is plain from the Callico-Act; whereby it is now become the occupation of women all over England, to convert their useless female habits into beds, window-curtains, chairs, and joint-stools; undressing themselves (as it were) before their transformation.