This principle is described in the unpublished Asti Manuscript, c. 1700, p. 63 of the Pieper translation. (This manuscript was translated in Gibecière, Vol. 8 No. 1, Winter 2013, p. 29-234.) The title reveals how it is used: “To have a card thought of and to send it of various [possible] piles, into the one a person wants, and if it does not succeed, you have another pile cut, and at whatever place he cuts he finds his card.”

Later the principle, applied to a card prediction, appears in R.P.'s Ein Spiel Karten, 1853, p. 54 of the Pieper translation. Under the title “Correct Guess”, three likely cards are maneuvered, one on top of the deck, one on the bottom, and the third on the table. The correct one is displayed when the mental selection is named.