Today's Stichomancy for Philip K. Dick
| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Fables by Robert Louis Stevenson: "Jupiter is longsuffering to the benighted," returned the
catechist.
"Upon my word, I could wish I had been less fortunate," said Jack.
"For if I had been born benighted, I might now be going free; and
it cannot be denied the iron is inconvenient, and the ulcer hurts."
"Ah!" cried his uncle, "do not envy the heathen! Theirs is a sad
lot! Ah, poor souls, if they but knew the joys of being fettered!
Poor souls, my heart yearns for them. But the truth is they are
vile, odious, insolent, ill-conditioned, stinking brutes, not truly
human - for what is a man without a fetter? - and you cannot be too
particular not to touch or speak with them."
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton by Edith Wharton: have made one plunge with the anchor; but the Reverend Ozias, on
being roused from his lucubrations, earnestly protested against
leaving his argument in suspense. What was the trifle of an
arrival at some Papistical foreign city, where the very churches
wore turbans like so many Moslem idolators, to the important fact
of Mr. Mounce's summing up his conclusions before the Muse of
Theology took flight? He should be happy, he said, if the tide
served, to visit Venice with Mr. Bracknell the next morning.
The next morning, ha!--Tony murmured a submissive "Yes, sir,"
winked at the subjugated captain, buckled on his sword, pressed
his hat down with a flourish, and before the Reverend Ozias had
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Timaeus by Plato: never naturally care for rational notions, but that it would be led away by
phantoms and visions night and day,--to be a remedy for this, God combined
with it the liver, and placed it in the house of the lower nature,
contriving that it should be solid and smooth, and bright and sweet, and
should also have a bitter quality, in order that the power of thought,
which proceeds from the mind, might be reflected as in a mirror which
receives likenesses of objects and gives back images of them to the sight;
and so might strike terror into the desires, when, making use of the bitter
part of the liver, to which it is akin, it comes threatening and invading,
and diffusing this bitter element swiftly through the whole liver produces
colours like bile, and contracting every part makes it wrinkled and rough;
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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 Battle of the Books by Jonathan Swift: makes this majority of opinions the voice of God. In like manner,
and for the very same reasons, it may perhaps be neither safe nor
prudent to argue against the abolishing of Christianity, at a
juncture when all parties seem so unanimously determined upon the
point, as we cannot but allow from their actions, their discourses,
and their writings. However, I know not how, whether from the
affectation of singularity, or the perverseness of human nature,
but so it unhappily falls out, that I cannot be entirely of this
opinion. Nay, though I were sure an order were issued for my
immediate prosecution by the Attorney-General, I should still
confess, that in the present posture of our affairs at home or
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