Horizontal spacing with HTML/CSS within parent div - html

Question

I am attempting to space elements throughout my webpage that are contained within a <div class="card"> from a template I am using. I have been trying to use inline CSS to space elements, as I am new to HTML/CSS and the CSS file from the template is difficult for me to navigate (and understand).
Inline CSS overrides the CSS files contained in the directory, as far as I understand. My elements looks like:
And I would like them to be spaced like:
My code looks like:
<div class="content">
<div class="container-fluid">
<div class="row">
<div class="col-md-12">
<div class="card ">
<div class="card-body">
<select class="custom-select">
<option selected>Zero</option>
<option value="1">One</option>
<option value="2">Two</option>
<option value="3">Three</option>
</select>
<div class="form-group">
<label for="comment">Input:</label>
<textarea class="form-control" rows="10" id="comment"></textarea>
</div>
<i class="material-icons" style="font-size: 48px;">arrow_forward</i>
<div class="form-group">
<label for="comment">Output:</label>
<textarea class="form-control" rows="10" id="comment"></textarea>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
I have tried a number of methods to get this to work, and nothing has worked particularly well for me. My question is, how can I achieve the spacing I laid out in the second picture?

Answer 1

That's the CSS I applied to your html.
.card-body > select {
vertical-align: top;
}
.card-body > div {
vertical-align: middle;
display:inline-block;
}
Demo link

Answer 2

You said you wanted inline css, so I did inline css.
We are doing display:inline-block so that we can keep our divs on the same row, float-left so they are positioned as far left as possible without colliding with other elements.
On class custom-select we also set the position to relative which enables us to do top:35px which moves that element down 35 pixels. I did that because that's sort of how it appears in your image.
Finally the use of !important will override ANY css usually unless !important is declared elsewhere, then you may still have a conflict. I highly doubt it's declared elsewhere however as there is no real point to doing it unless you want to override a previous setting.
<div class="content">
<div class="container-fluid">
<div class="row">
<div class="col-md-12">
<div class="card ">
<div class="card-body">
<select class="custom-select" style="display:inline-block !important;float:left !important;position:relative;top:35px">
<option selected>Zero</option>
<option value="1">One</option>
<option value="2">Two</option>
<option value="3">Three</option>
</select>
<div class="form-group" style="display:inline-block !important;float:left !important">
<label for="comment">Input:</label>
<textarea class="form-control" rows="10" id="comment"></textarea>
</div>
<i class="material-icons" style="font-size: 48px;display:inline-block !important;float:left !important">-›</i>
<div class="form-group" style="display:inline-block !important;float:left !important">
<label for="comment">Output:</label>
<textarea class="form-control" rows="10" id="comment"></textarea>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
JSFIDDLE: https://jsfiddle.net/hw2tv6g1/