Today's Stichomancy for Billy Joel

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

"The circumstances to which we of this canton owe the presence among us of Baron Seraphitus, the beloved cousin of Swedenborg, enabled me to know all the events of the extraordinary life of that prophet. He has lately been accused of imposture in certain quarters of Europe, and the public prints reported the following fact based on a letter written by the Chevalier Baylon. Swedenborg, they said, informed by certain senators of a secret correspondence of the late Queen of Sweden with her brother, the Prince of Prussia, revealed his knowledge of the secrets contained in that correspondence to the Queen, making her believe he had obtained this knowledge by supernatural means. A man worthy of all confidence, Monsieur Charles-Leonhard de

Seraphita

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Aspern Papers by Henry James:

so that if there were suffering (and American suffering), she should at least not have it on her conscience. The "little one" received her in the great cold, tarnished Venetian sala, the central hall of the house, paved with marble and roofed with dim crossbeams, and did not even ask her to sit down. This was not encouraging for me, who wished to sit so fast, and I remarked as much to Mrs. Prest. She however replied with profundity, "Ah, but there's all the difference: I went to confer a favor and you will go to ask one. If they are proud you will be on the right side." And she offered to show me their house to begin with--to row me thither in her gondola. I let her know that I had already been to look at it half a dozen times;

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Glimpses of the Moon by Edith Wharton:

after our expedition to Mesopotamia?" she pressed on, a little breathlessly.

"You're awfully kind: but I don't know--"

She stood up with one of her abrupt movements. "You needn't, all at once. Take time think it over. Father wanted me to ask you," she appended.

He felt the inadequacy of his response. "It tempts me awfully, of course. But I must wait, at any rate--wait for letters. The fact is I shall have to wire from Rhodes to have them sent. I had chucked everything, even letters, for a few weeks."

"Ah, you are tired," she murmured, giving him a last downward

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 Children of the Night by Edwin Arlington Robinson:

What was the matter? Did God forget? . . .

But he wrought them at last with a skill so sure That her eyes were the eyes of a deathless woman, -- With a gleam of heaven to make them pure, And a glimmer of hell to make them human.

God never forgets. -- And he worships her There in that same still room of his, For his wife, and his constant arbiter Of the world that was and the world that is.

And he wonders yet what her love could be To punish him after that strife so grim;