Today's Stichomancy for William T. Sherman

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Criminal Sociology by Enrico Ferri:

Exchange bargains are scrupulously discharged, though for them there is neither penal obligation nor evidence in writing. And it may be added that imprisonment for debt never promoted the fulfilment of contracts, nor has its abolition discouraged it.

As for the lower classes, one visit to a prison suffices. There, if you ask a prisoner why the punishment did not deter him from the crime, you generally get no answer, because he has never thought about it. Or else he replies, as I have often found, that ``if you were afraid of hurting yourself when you went to work, you would give up working.'' These indeed are what one would expect to be the feelings prevailing amongst the lower social

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Rape of Lucrece by William Shakespeare:

Writ in the glassy margents of such books; She touch'd no unknown baits, nor fear'd no hooks; Nor could she moralize his wanton sight, More than his eyes were open'd to the light.

He stories to her ears her husband's fame, Won in the fields of fruitful Italy; And decks with praises Collatine's high name, Made glorious by his manly chivalry With bruised arms and wreaths of victory: Her joy with heav'd-up hand she doth express, And, wordless, so greets heaven for his success.

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Complete Angler by Izaak Walton:

the earth, seems to be made probable by the barnacles and young goslings bred by the sun's heat and the rotten planks of an old ship, and hatched of trees; both which are related for truths by Du Bartas and Lobel, and also by our learned Camden, and laborious Gerhard in his Herbal.

It is said by Rondeletius, that those Eels that are bred in rivers that relate to or be nearer to the sea, never return to the fresh waters, as the Salmon does always desire to do, when they have once tasted the salt water; and I do the more easily believe this, because I am certain that powdered beef is a most excellent bait to catch an Eel. And though Sir Francis Bacon will allow the Eel's life to be but ten years, yet he, in his

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 United States Bill of Rights:

to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense.

VII

In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury shall be otherwise re-examined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.

VIII

Excessive bail shall not be required nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.