Today's Stichomancy for Phil Mickelson

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Democracy In America, Volume 1 by Alexis de Toqueville:

for his actions, he ought not to be forced to employ agents who had forfeited his esteem. See Kent's "Commentaries, vol. i. p. 289.] [Footnote r: [This comparison applied to the Constitutional King of France and to the powers he held under the Charter of 1830, till the overthrow of the monarchy in 1848. - Translator's Note.]]

Nevertheless, the supremacy of public opinion is no less above the head of the one than of the other. This power is less definite, less evident, and less sanctioned by the laws in France

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Lin McLean by Owen Wister:

"Astonishment makes a man say anything," I proceeded. "And I'll say again you're too good for her--and I'll say I don't generally believe in the wife being older than the husband."

"What's two years?" said Lin.

I was near screeching out again, but saved myself. He was not quite twenty-five, and I remembered Mrs. Taylor's unprejudiced computation of the biscuit-shooter's years. It is a lady's prerogative, however, to estimate her own age.

"She had her twenty-seventh birthday last month," said Lin, with sentiment, bringing his horse entirely abreast of mine. "I promised her a bear-skin."

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

The best tales are told at a certain hour--just as we are all here at table. No one ever told a story well standing up, or fasting.

"If I were to reproduce exactly Rosalie's diffuse eloquence, a whole volume would scarcely contain it. Now, as the event of which she gave me a confused account stands exactly midway between the notary's gossip and that of Madame Lepas, as precisely as the middle term of a rule-of-three sum stands between the first and third, I have only to relate it in as few words as may be. I shall therefore be brief.

"The room at la Grande Breteche in which Madame de Merret slept was on the ground floor; a little cupboard in the wall, about four feet deep, served her to hang her dresses in. Three months before the evening of

La Grande Breteche

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 Apology by Xenophon:

corrupt the young. We know, I fancy, what such corrupting influences are; and perhaps you will tell us if you know of any one who, under my influence, has been changed from a religous into an irreligious man; who, from being sober-minded, has become prodigal; from being a moderate drinker has become a wine-bibber and a drunkard; from being a lover of healthy honest toil has become effeminate, or under the thrall of some other wicked pleasure."

[28] Lit. "whom do you know," and so throughout.

[29] Cf. Plat. "Phaed." 66 C.

[30] Or, "so attempered and adjusted." The phrase savours of "cynic." theory.

The Apology