Today's Stichomancy for Louis B. Mayer

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from I Have A Dream by Martin Luther King, Jr.:

note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check which has come back marked "insufficient funds." But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. So we have come to cash this check -- a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice. We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now

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

life extended over seven lustres.

Marcas! Does it not hint of some precious object that is broken with a fall, with or without a crash?

I had finished studying the law in Paris in 1836. I lived at that time in the Rue Corneille in a house where none but students came to lodge, one of those large houses where there is a winding staircase quite at the back lighted below from the street, higher up by borrowed lights, and at the top by a skylight. There were forty furnished rooms-- furnished as students' rooms are! What does youth demand more than was here supplied? A bed, a few chairs, a chest of drawers, a looking- glass, and a table. As soon as the sky is blue the student opens his

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Poor and Proud by Oliver Optic:

home.

This was Katy's first day in mercantile life; it had been full of incidents, and she feared her path might be a thorny one. But her light heart soon triumphed over doubts and fears, and when she reached Washington Street, she was as enthusiastic as ever, and as ready for a trade.

CHAPTER XI.

KATY MEETS WITH EXTRAORDINARY SUCCESS.

"Buy some candy?" said Katy to the first gentleman she met.

He did not even deign to glance at her; and five or six attempts to sell a stick of candy were failures; but when she remembered

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 Several Works by Edgar Allan Poe:

cannot distinguish Sherry from Amontillado."

Thus speaking, Fortunato possessed himself of my arm. Putting on a mask of black silk, and drawing a roquelaire closely about my person, I suffered him to hurry me to my palazzo.

There were no attendants at home; they had absconded to make merry in honour of the time. I had told them that I should not return until the morning, and had given them explicit orders not to stir from the house. These orders were sufficient, I well knew, to insure their immediate disappearance, one and all, as soon as my back was turned.

I took from their sconces two flambeaux, and giving one to