Today's Stichomancy for Jet Li

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Crowd by Gustave le Bon:

an isolated individual would not gain strength, becomes at once furious hatred in the case of an individual in a crowd.

The violence of the feelings of crowds is also increased, especially in heterogeneous crowds, by the absence of all sense of responsibility. The certainty of impunity, a certainty the stronger as the crowd is more numerous, and the notion of a considerable momentary force due to number, make possible in the case of crowds sentiments and acts impossible for the isolated individual. In crowds the foolish, ignorant, and envious persons are freed from the sense of their insignificance and powerlessness, and are possessed instead by the notion of brutal

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie:

all the details of this thing whether they seemed to me relevant or not."

"And I am pleased with you. You have a good memory, and you have given me the facts faithfully. Of the order in which you present them, I say nothing--truly, it is deplorable! But I make allowances--you are upset. To that I attribute the circumstance that you have omitted one fact of paramount importance."

"What is that?" I asked.

"You have not told me if Mrs. Inglethorp ate well last night."

I stared at him. Surely the war had affected the little man's brain. He was carefully engaged in brushing his coat before

The Mysterious Affair at Styles

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Duchesse de Langeais by Honore de Balzac:

yourself, give it into his hands, and ask him, as you men can ask things between yourselves--for you have a code of honour between man and man which you do not use with us, and a different way of regarding things between yourselves--ask him if he will read this letter? Not in your presence. Certain feelings men hide from each other. I give you authority to say, if you think it necessary to bring him, that it is a question of life or death for me. If he deigns----"

"DEIGNS!" repeated the Vidame.

"If he deigns to read it," the Duchess continued with dignity, "say one thing more. You will go to see him about five o'clock,

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 Miracle Mongers and Their Methods by Harry Houdini:

on which he walked barefoot, and stepping on it occasionally and back onto the hot iron, when a loud hissing and a cloud of steam bore ample proof of the high temperature of the metal.

One of the more recent fireproofs was Eugene Rivalli, whose act included, besides the usual effects, a cage of fire in which he stood completely surrounded by flames. Rivalli, whose right name was John Watkins, died in 1900, in England. He had appeared in Great Britain and Ireland as well as on the Continent

Miracle Mongers and Their Methods