Today's Stichomancy for Orson Welles

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Soul of Man by Oscar Wilde:

are not at war with Time. They take no count of its succession. In one moment their unity may be apprehended. In the case of literature it is different. Time must be traversed before the unity of effect is realised. And so, in the drama, there may occur in the first act of the play something whose real artistic value may not be evident to the spectator till the third or fourth act is reached. Is the silly fellow to get angry and call out, and disturb the play, and annoy the artists? No. The honest man is to sit quietly, and know the delightful emotions of wonder, curiosity, and suspense. He is not to go to the play to lose a vulgar temper. He is to go to the play to realise an artistic temperament. He is

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Parmenides by Plato:

Then the one, being of this nature, cannot be in time at all; for must not that which is in time, be always growing older than itself?

Certainly.

And that which is older, must always be older than something which is younger?

True.

Then, that which becomes older than itself, also becomes at the same time younger than itself, if it is to have something to become older than.

What do you mean?

I mean this:--A thing does not need to become different from another thing which is already different; it IS different, and if its different has

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Poems by Bronte Sisters:

Its summer blossoms scent the air; Yet wait till winter comes again, And who will call the wild-briar fair?

Then, scorn the silly rose-wreath now, And deck thee with the holly's sheen, That, when December blights thy brow, He still may leave thy garland green.

THE ELDER'S REBUKE.

"Listen! When your hair, like mine, Takes a tint of silver gray; When your eyes, with dimmer shine,

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 Tanach:

Ezekiel 7: 7 The turn is come unto thee, O inhabitant of the land; the time is come, the day of tumult is near, and not of joyful shouting upon the mountains.

Ezekiel 7: 8 Now will I shortly pour out My fury upon thee, and spend Mine anger upon thee, and will judge thee according to thy ways; and I will bring upon thee all thine abominations.

Ezekiel 7: 9 And Mine eye shall not spare, neither will I have pity; I will bring upon thee according to thy ways, and thine abominations shall be in the midst of thee; and ye shall know that I the LORD do smite.

Ezekiel 7: 10 Behold the day; behold, it cometh; the turn is come forth; the rod hath blossomed, arrogancy hath budded.

Ezekiel 7: 11 Violence is risen up into a rod of wickedness; nought cometh from them, nor from their tumult, nor from their turmoil, neither is there eminency among them.

Ezekiel 7: 12 The time is come, the day draweth near; let not the buyer rejoice, nor the seller mourn; for wrath is upon all the multitude thereof.

Ezekiel 7: 13 For the seller shall not return to that which is sold, although they be yet alive; for the vision is touching the whole multitude thereof, which shall not return; neither shall any stand possessed of the iniquity of his life.

Ezekiel 7: 14 They have blown the horn, and have made all ready, but none goeth to the battle; for My wrath is upon all the multitude thereof.

Ezekiel 7: 15 The sword is without, and the pestilence and the famine within; he that is in the field shall die with the sword, and he that is in the city, famine and pestilence shall devour him.

The Tanach