Today's Stichomancy for Karl Rove

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Girl with the Golden Eyes by Honore de Balzac:

talismanic existence. But at the appointed time, in the evening, he was waiting--and he had not long to wait--for the carriage. The mulatto approached Henri, in order to repeat to him in French a phrase which he seemed to have learned by heart.

"If you wish to come, she told me, you must consent to have your eyes bandaged."

And Cristemio produced a white silk handkerchief.

"No!" said Henri, whose omnipotence revolted suddenly.

He tried to leap in. The mulatto made a sign, and the carriage drove off.

"Yes!" cried De Marsay, furious at the thought of losing a piece of

The Girl with the Golden Eyes

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Drama on the Seashore by Honore de Balzac:

the power to dip into the treasury of Aboul Casem. But we saw a splendid lobster and a crab fastened to a string which the fisherman was dangling in his right hand, while with the left he held his tackle and his net.

We accosted him with the intention of buying his haul,--an idea which came to us both, and was expressed in a smile, to which I responded by a slight pressure of the arm I held and drew toward my heart. It was one of those nothings of which memory makes poems when we sit by the fire and recall the hour when that nothing moved us, and the place where it did so,--a mirage the effects of which have never been noted down, though it appears on the objects that surround us in moments

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Rig Veda:

6 He who maintains the Laws of God informed me that thou wast lying hidden in the waters. Indra, who knoweth well, beheld and showed thee. By him instructed am I come, O Agni.

7 The stranger asks the way of him who knows it: taught by the skilful guide he travels onward. This is, in truth, the blessing of instruction: he finds the path that

The Rig Veda

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 On Revenues by Xenophon:

without hindrance, the result would be that far more traders would trade with us and with greater satisfaction.

[5] Cf. "Hiero," ix. 6, 7, 11; "Hipparch." i. 26.

[6] {to tou emporiou arkhe}. Probably he is referring to the {epimeletai emporiou} (overseers of the market). See Harpocr. s.v.; Aristot. "Athenian Polity," 51.

[7] For the sort of case, see Demosth. (or Deinarch.) "c. Theocr." 1324; Zurborg ad loc.; Boeckh, I. ix. xv. (pp. 48, 81, Eng. tr.)

It would indeed be a good and noble institution to pay special marks of honour, such as the privilege of the front seat, to merchants and shipowners, and on occasion to invite to hospitable entertainment