Today's Stichomancy for Mao Zedong

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

the heart. Her eyes were bright and dark and expressive, her movements graceful, her foot charming. An experienced man of pleasure would not have given her more than thirty years, her forehead was so girlish. She had all the most transient delicate detail of youth in her face. In character she seemed to me to resemble the Comtesse de Lignolles and the Marquise de B----, two feminine types always fresh in the memory of any young man who has read Louvet's romance.

In a moment I saw how things stood, and took a diplomatic course that would have done credit to an old ambassador. For once, and perhaps for the only time in my life, I used tact, and knew in

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians by Martin Luther:

God. His case was parallel to that of Peter's, who was particularly commissioned to preach the Gospel to the Jews.

The apostles had the same charge, the identical Gospel. Peter did not proclaim a different Gospel, nor had he appointed his fellow apostles. They were equals. They were all taught of God. None was greater than the other, none could point to prerogatives above the other. To justify his usurped primacy in the Church the Pope claims that Peter was the chief of the apostles. This is an impudent falsehood.

VERSE 8. For he that wrought effectually in Peter.

With these words Paul refutes another argument of the false apostles. "What reason have the false apostles to boast that the Gospel of Peter was mighty,

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Master of Ballantrae by Robert Louis Stevenson:

his unavailing efforts. Sir William, leaving a small party under my command, proceeded on his embassy with the first light; and still the Indian rubbed the limbs and breathed in the mouth of the dead body. You would think such labours might have vitalised a stone; but, except for that one moment (which was my lord's death), the black spirit of the Master held aloof from its discarded clay; and by about the hour of noon, even the faithful servant was at length convinced. He took it with unshaken quietude.

"Too cold," said he, "good way in India, no good here." And, asking for some food, which he ravenously devoured as soon as it was set before him, he drew near to the fire and took his place at

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 Taming of the Shrew by William Shakespeare:

Adonis painted by a running brook, And Cytherea all in sedges hid, Which seem to move and wanton with her breath Even as the waving sedges play with wind.

LORD. We'll show thee Io as she was a maid And how she was beguiled and surpris'd, As lively painted as the deed was done.

THIRD SERVANT. Or Daphne roaming through a thorny wood, Scratching her legs, that one shall swear she bleeds

The Taming of the Shrew