some strange confluence of events, some mysterious agency of fate. The
great are always fortunate, and therefore mostly seekers into the decrees
of fortune."

So great is the influence which enthusiasm, right or wrong, always
exercises over us, that even the hard and acute Radclyffe-who had entered
the room with the most profound contempt for the pretensions of the
soothsayer, and partly from a wish to find materials for ridiculing a
folly of the day, partly, it may be from the desire to examine which
belonged to his nature--began to consider in his own mind whether he
should yield to his curiosity, now strongly excited, and pledge himself to
the preliminary penance the diviner had ordained.

The soothsayer continued:--

"The stars, and the clime, and the changing moon have power over us--why
not? Do they not have influence over the rest of nature? But we can only
unravel their more august and hidden secrets, by giving full wing to the
creative spirit which first taught us their elementary nature, and which,
when released from earth, will have full range to wander over their
brilliant fields. Know in one word, the Imagination and the Soul are one,
one indivisible and the same; on that truth rests all my lore."

"And if I followed your precepts, what other preliminaries would you
enjoin?"

"Not until thou engagest to perform them, will I tell thee more."

"I engage!"