"The sequence of every one of
those cards was determined when we were yet star-dust."
I bring confusion to him by performing half a dozen other shuffles. I am
thus far the master of my unborn game--another last shuffle to prove it,
though I shuffle clumsily enough.
I glance disdainfully at the fatalist whom I have refuted, and prepare
again to lay down the first row of cards. But the fellow comes back
with, "Those last shuffles were also determined, as was this
challenge--"
"Very well!" and I prepare for still another rearrangement. But here I
reflect that this could be endless and not at all interesting.
I dismiss the fatalist as a quibbler and play on. Now there is no
dispute, unless there be other quibblers. Fixed is the order in which
the cards shall fall, eight at a time. There is pure fatalism. But in
the movings after each eight are dealt, I shall consciously choose and
judge, which is pure free will--or an imitation of it sufficiently
colorable to satisfy any, but quibblers. There, for me, is the fatalism
of body, the free will of soul. Of these I learn when I play the game.
Now my first eight cards are down in a horizontal row. There are two
kings among them, which is auspicious, for kings must be placed sometime
at the top.
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