Today's Stichomancy for Richard Burton

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Lamentable Tragedy of Locrine and Mucedorus by William Shakespeare:

Right noble father, we will rule the land, Enthronized in seats of Topaz stones, That Locrine and his brethren all may know, None must be king but Humber and his son.

HUMBER. Courage, my son, fortune shall favour us, And yield to us the coronet of bay, That decked none but noble conquerours. But what saith Estrild to these regions? How liketh she the temperature thereof? Are they not pleasant in her gracious eyes?

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

for a moment, and presently went to a table and began to arrange certain books and knick-knacks. Newman was struck with the high respectability of her appearance; he was afraid to address her as a servant. She busied herself for some moments with putting the table in order and pulling the curtains straight, while Newman walked slowly to and fro. He perceived at last from her reflection in the mirror, as he was passing that her hands were idle and that she was looking at him intently. She evidently wished to say something, and Newman, perceiving it, helped her to begin.

"You are English?" he asked.

"Yes, sir, please," she answered, quickly and softly;

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Polity of Athenians and Lacedaemonians by Xenophon:

fashion should produce a splendid offspring?

[4] Cf. a fragment of Critias cited by Clement, "Stromata," vi. p. 741, 6; Athen. x. 432, 433; see "A Fragment of Xenophon" (?), ap. Stob. "Flor." 88. 14, translated by J. Hookham Frere, "Theognis Restitutus," vol. i. 333; G. Sauppe, "Append. de Frag. Xen." p. 293; probably by Antisthenes (Bergk. ii. 497).

[5] Or, "such technical work is for the most part sedentary."

Lycurgus pursued a different path. Clothes were things, he held, the furnishing of which might well enough be left to female slaves. And, believing that the highest function of a free woman was the bearing of children, in the first place he insisted on the training of the body

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 Democracy In America, Volume 1 by Alexis de Toqueville:

a field prepared by the Creator for the efforts of the intelligence. Contented with the freedom and the power which it enjoys in its own sphere, and with the place which it occupies, the empire of religion is never more surely established than when it reigns in the hearts of men unsupported by aught beside its native strength. Religion is no less the companion of liberty in all its battles and its triumphs; the cradle of its infancy, and the divine source of its claims. The safeguard of morality is religion, and morality is the best security of law and the surest pledge of freedom. *m

[Footnote m: See Appendix, F.]