Today's Stichomancy for Vincent Van Gogh

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Golden Sayings of Epictetus by Epictetus:

wilt; lo, I have means and powers given me by Thee to acquit myself with honour through whatever comes to pass!"-- No; but there you sit, trembling for fear certain things should come to pass, and moaning and groaning and lamenting over what does come to pass. And then you upbraid the Gods. Such meanness of spirit can have but one result--impiety.

Yet God has not only given us these faculties by means of which we may bear everything that comes to pass without being curshed or depressed thereby; but like a good King and Father, He has given us this without let or hindrance, placed wholly at our own disposition, without reserving to Himself any power of

The Golden Sayings of Epictetus

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

of which he could not penetrate.

"Oh! nothing that would interest you," replied his wife.

Monsieur de Listomere tranquilly returned to the reading of his paper, and presently said:--

"Ah! Madame de Mortsauf is dead; your poor brother has, no doubt, gone to Clochegourde."

"Are you aware, monsieur," resumed the marquise, turning to Eugene, "that what you have just said is a great impertinence?"

"If I did not know the strictness of your principles," he answered, naively, "I should think that you wished either to give me ideas which I deny myself, or else to tear a secret from me. But perhaps you are

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Altar of the Dead by Henry James:

feet with a movement that made him turn, supporting himself by the back of a bench. Behind him was a prostrate figure, a figure he had seen before; a woman in deep mourning, bowed in grief or in prayer. He had seen her in other days - the first time of his entrance there, and he now slightly wavered, looking at her again till she seemed aware he had noticed her. She raised her head and met his eyes: the partner of his long worship had come back. She looked across at him an instant with a face wondering and scared; he saw he had made her afraid. Then quickly rising she came straight to him with both hands out.

"Then you COULD come? God sent you!" he murmured with a happy

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 A Legend of Montrose by Walter Scott:

the city, and the resolute valour of Montrose's followers was again successful against every disadvantage.

But it was the fate of this great commander, always to gain the glory, but seldom to reap the fruits of victory. He had scarcely time to repose his small army in Aberdeen, ere he found, on the one hand, that the Gordons were likely to be deterred from joining him, by the reasons we have mentioned, with some others peculiar to their chief, the Marquis of Huntly; on the other hand, Argyle, whose forces had been augmented by those of several Lowland noblemen, advanced towards Montrose at the head of an army much larger than he had yet had to cope with. These troops