Today's Stichomancy for Charisma Carpenter

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Straight Deal by Owen Wister:

generation of my elders never wholly got over the rage and the wound. They hated all England for the sake of less than half England. They counted their enemies but never their friends. There's nothing unnatural about this, nothing rare. On the contrary, it's the usual, natural, unjust thing that human nature does in times of agony. It's the Henry Ward Beechers that are rare. In times of agony the average man and woman see nothing but their agony. When I look over some of the letters that I received from England in 1915--letters from strangers evoked by a book called The Pentecost of Calamity, wherein I had published my conviction that the cause of England was righteous, the cause of Germany hideous, and our own persistent neutrality unworthy--I'm glad I lost my temper

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Three Taverns by Edwin Arlington Robinson:

Remember me -- and think what I have thought.

Now, mind you, I say nothing of what was, Or never was, or could or could not be: Bring not suspicion's candle to the glass That mirrors a friend's face to memory.

Of what you see, see all, -- but see no more; For what I show you here will not be there. The devil has had his way with paint before, And he's an artist, -- and you needn't stare.

There was a painter and he painted well: He'd paint you Daniel in the lions' den,

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Smalcald Articles by Dr. Martin Luther:

power, but belongs to God alone, to judge which, how great, and how many the sins are, as it is written in Ps. 143, 2: Enter not into judgment with Thy servant; for in Thy sight shall no man living be justified. And Paul, 1 Cor. 4, 4, says: For I know nothing by myself; yet am I not hereby justified.

VIII. Of Confession.

Since Absolution or the Power of the Keys is also an aid and consolation against sin and a bad conscience, ordained by Christ [Himself] in the Gospel, Confession or Absolution ought by no means to be abolished in the Church, especially on account of [tender and] timid consciences and on account of

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 Psychology of Revolution by Gustave le Bon:

the enemy, and pushes them under the knife. . . . Why? What is his aim? No one knows; he is not in any way ambitious; he desires neither power nor money.''

I do not think it would be difficult to answer why. The thirst for blood, of which we have already spoken, and which is very common among certain criminals, perfectly explains the conduct of Billaud-Varennes. Bandits of this type kill for the sake of killing, as sportsmen shoot game--for the very pleasure of exercising their taste for destruction. In ordinary times men endowed with these homicidal tendencies refrain, generally from fear of the policeman and the scaffold. When they are able to