Today's Stichomancy for Neal Stephenson

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Madam How and Lady Why by Charles Kingsley:

the gorge of the Avon which we have steamed through.

And what is that black above it?

That is the coal, a few miles off, marked C.

And what is this D, which comes next?

That is what we are on now. New red sandstone, lying unconformably on the coal. I showed it you in the bed of the river, as we came along in the cab. We are here in a sort of amphitheatre, or half a one, with the limestone hills around us, and the new red sandstone plastered on, as it were, round the bottom of it inside.

But what is this high bit with E against it?

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Golden Threshold by Sarojini Naidu:

O king, thy kingdom who from thee can wrest? What fate shall dare uncrown thee from this breast, O god-born lover, whom my love doth gird And armour with impregnable delight Of Hope's triumphant keen flame-carven sword?

THE QUEEN'S RIVAL

QUEEN Gulnaar sat on her ivory bed, Around her countless treasures were spread;

Her chamber walls were richly inlaid With agate, porphory, onyx and jade;

The tissues that veiled her delicate breast,

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Anthem by Ayn Rand:

than twenty and all the women older than eighteen are sent for one night to the City Palace of Mating. And each of the men have one of the women assigned to them by the Council of Eugenics. Children are born each winter, but women never see their children and children never know their parents. Twice have we been sent to the Palace of Mating, but it is an ugly and shameful matter, of which we do not like to think.

We had broken so many laws, and today

Anthem

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 Tanach:

Deuteronomy 33: 29 Happy art thou, O Israel, who is like unto thee? a people saved by the LORD, the shield of thy help, and that is the sword of thy excellency! And thine enemies shall dwindle away before thee; and thou shalt tread upon their high places.

Deuteronomy 34: 1 And Moses went up from the plains of Moab unto mount Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, that is over against Jericho. And the LORD showed him all the land, even Gilead as far as Dan;

Deuteronomy 34: 2 and all Naphtali, and the land of Ephraim and Manasseh, and all the land of Judah as far as the hinder sea;

Deuteronomy 34: 3 and the South, and the Plain, even the valley of Jericho the city of palm-trees, as far as Zoar.

Deuteronomy 34: 4 And the LORD said unto him: 'This is the land which I swore unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob, saying: I will give it unto thy seed; I have caused thee to see it with thine eyes, but thou shalt not go over thither.'

Deuteronomy 34: 5 So Moses the servant of the LORD died there in the land of Moab, according to the word of the LORD.

Deuteronomy 34: 6 And he was buried in the valley in the land of Moab over against Beth-peor; and no man knoweth of his sepulchre unto this day.

Deuteronomy 34: 7 And Moses was a hundred and twenty years old when he died: his eye was not dim, nor his natural force abated.

Deuteronomy 34: 8 And the children of Israel wept for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days; so the days of weeping in the mourning for Moses were ended.

The Tanach