Today's Stichomancy for Eric Bana

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Dreams & Dust by Don Marquis:

His life, that is the one thing wonder-worth; Not how He came, but how He lived on earth. For if gods stoop, and with quaint jugglery Mock nature's laws, how shall that profit thee?-- The nobler lesson is that mortals can Grow godlike through this baffled front of man!

AT LAST

EACH race has died and lived and fought for the "true" gods of that poor race, Unconsciously, divinest thought of each race gild- ing its god's face.

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

he was less worthy than she had thought him.

CHAPTER II

Three months after the first meeting of Porbus and Poussin, the former went to see Maitre Frenhofer. He found the old man a prey to one of those deep, self-developed discouragements, whose cause, if we are to believe the mathematicians of health, lies in a bad digestion, in the wind, in the weather, in some swelling of the intestines, or else, according to casuists, in the imperfections of our moral nature; the fact being that the good man was simply worn out by the effort to complete his mysterious picture. He was seated languidly in a large oaken chair of vast dimensions covered with black leather; and without

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Polity of Athenians and Lacedaemonians by Xenophon:

ii.

The above is a fairly exhaustive statement of the institutions traceable to the legislation of Lycurgus in connection with the successive stages[1] of a citizen's life. It remains that I should endeavour to describe the style of living which he established for the whole body, irrespective of age. It will be understood that, when Lycurgus first came to deal with the question, the Spartans like the rest of the Hellenes, used to mess privately at home. Tracing more than half the current misdemeanours to this custom,[2] he was determined to drag his people out of holes and corners into the broad

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 Fantastic Fables by Ambrose Bierce:

"We are officers of the law, and have just returned from the pursuit of two murderous outlaws."

The Australian Grasshopper

A DISTINGUISHED Naturalist was travelling in Australia, when he saw a Kangaroo in session and flung a stone at it. The Kangaroo immediately adjourned, tracing against the sunset sky a parabolic curve spanning seven provinces, and evanished below the horizon. The Distinguished Naturalist looked interested, but said nothing for an hour; then he said to his native Guide:

"You have pretty wide meadows here, I suppose?"

"No, not very wide," the Guide answered; "about the same as in

Fantastic Fables