Today's Stichomancy for Robert Anton Wilson

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia by Samuel Johnson:

knowledge is an acquisition greatly attained, and poetry is a gift conferred at once; or that the first poetry of every nation surprised them as a novelty, and retained the credit by consent which it received by accident at first; or whether, as the province of poetry is to describe nature and passion, which are always the same, the first writers took possession of the most striking objects for description and the most probable occurrences for fiction, and left nothing to those that followed them but transcription of the same events and new combinations of the same images. Whatever be the reason, it is commonly observed that the early writers are in possession of nature, and their followers of

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson:

Treasure Island

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Faith of Men by Jack London:

which he gave her. The two sons were loud in the praise of their new mother; McLean and McTavish lifted their voices; and the Factor bragged of the joys of matrimony till the story of her good behaviour and her husband's satisfaction became the property of all the dwellers in the Sin Rock district.

Whereupon Snettishane, with visions of his incalculable interest keeping him awake of nights, thought it time to bestir himself. On the tenth night of her wedded life Lit-lit was awakened by the croaking of a raven, and she knew that Snettishane was waiting for her by the river bank. In her great happiness she had forgotten her pact, and now it came back to her with behind it all the

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 Contrast by Royall Tyler:

The man of her choice! And pray, Mary, an't you going to marry the man of your choice--what trum- pery notion is this? It is these vile books [throwing them away]. I'd have you to know, Mary, if you won't make young Van Dumpling the man of your choice, you shall marry him as the man of my choice.

MARIA

You terrify me, Sir. Indeed, Sir, I am all submission. My will is yours.

VAN ROUGH

Why, that is the way your mother us'd to talk.