646 lines
38 KiB
Plaintext
646 lines
38 KiB
Plaintext
"Magick is the Highest, most Absolute, and most Divine
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Knowledge of Natural Philosophy; advanced in its works and
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wonderful operations by a right understanding of the inward and
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occult virtue of things; so that true Agents being applied to proper
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Patients, strange and admirable effects will thereby be produced.
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Whence magicians are profound and diligent searchers into
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Nature; they, because of their skill, know how to anticipate an
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effect, the which to the vulgar shall seem to be a miracle."
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The Goetia of the Lemegeton of King Solomon.
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*
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"Whenever sympathetic magic occurs in its pure unadulterated
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form, it is assumed that in nature one event follows another
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necessarily and invariably without the intervention of any spiritual
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or personal agency.
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Thus its fundamental conception is identical with that of
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modern science; underlying the whole system is a faith,
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implicit but real and firm, in the order and uniformity of
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nature. The magician does not doubt that the same causes will
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always produce the same effects, that the performance of the
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proper ceremony accompanied by the appropriate spell, will
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inevitably be attended by the desired results, unless, indeed, his
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incantations should chance to be thwarted and foiled by the more
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potent charms of another sorcerer. He supplicates no higher
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power: he sues the favour of no fickle and wayward being: he
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abases himself before no awful deity. Yet his power, great as he
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believes it to be, is by no means arbitrary and unlimited. He can
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wield it only so long as he strictly conforms to the rules of his
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art, or to what may be called the laws of nature as conceived by
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him. To neglect these rules, to break these laws in the smallest
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particular is to incur failure, and may even expose the unskilful
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practitioner himself to the utmost peril. If he claims a sovereignty
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over nature, it is a constitutional sovereignty rigorously limited in
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its scope and excercised in exact conformity with ancient usage.
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Thus the anology between the magical and the scientific
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conceptions of the world is close. In both of them the
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succession of events is perfectly regular and certain, being
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determined by immutable laws, the operation of which can
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be forseen and calculated precisely; the elements of caprice,
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of chance, and of accident are banished from the course of nature.
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Both of them open up a seemingly boundless vista of possibilities
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to him who knows the causes of things and can touch the secret
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springs that set in motion the vast and intricate mechanism of the
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world. Hence the strong attraction which magic and science alike
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have exercised on the human mind; hence the powerful stimulus
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that both have given to the pursuit of knowledge. They lure the
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weary enquirer, the footsore seeker, on through the wilderness of
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disappointment in the present by their endless promises of the
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future: they take him up to the top of an exceeding high mountain
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and shew him, beyond the dark clouds and rolling mist at his feet,
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a vision of the celestial city, far off, it may be, but radiant with
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unearthly splendour, bathed in the light of dreams."
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Dr. J. G. FRAZER, "The Golden Bough".
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*
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"So far, therefore, as the public profession of magic has
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been one of the roads by which men have passed to supreme
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power, it has contributed to emancipate mankind from the
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thraldom of tradition and to elevate them into a larger, freer
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life, with a broader outlook on the world. This is no small
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service rendered to humanity. And when we remember
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further that in another direction magic has paved ther way for
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science, we are forced to admit that if the black arts has done much
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evil, it has also been the source of much good; that if it is the
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child of error, it has been the mother of freedom and
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truth."
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Ibid.
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*
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"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good".
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St. Paul.
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*
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"Also the mantras and the spells; the obeah and the wanga; the
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work of the wand and the work of the sword: these he shall learn
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and teach.
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"He must teach; but he may make severe the ordeals.
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"The word of the Law is THELEMA."
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LIBER AL vel xxxi: The Book of the Law.
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-----------
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This book is for
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ALL:
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for every man, woman, and child.
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My former work has been misunderstood, and its scope limited,
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by my use of technical terms. It has attracted only too many
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dilettanti and eccentrics, weaklings seeking in "Magic" an escape
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from reality. I myself was first consciously drawn to the subject
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in this way. And it has repelled only too many scientific and
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practical minds, such as I most designed to influence.
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But
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MAGICK
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is for
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ALL.
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I have written this book to help the Banker, the Pugilist, the
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Biologist, the Poet, the Navvy, the Grocer, the Factory Girl, the
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Mathematician, the Stenographer, the Golfer, the Wife, the
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Consul--and all the rest--to fulfil themselves perfectly, each
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in his or her own proper function.
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Let me explain in a few words how it came about that I blazoned
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the word
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MAGICK
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upon the Banner that I have borne before me all my life.
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Before I touched my teens, I was already aware that I was The
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Beast whose number is 666. I did not understand in the least
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what that implied; it was a passionately ecstatic sense of identity.
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In my third year at Cambridge, I devoted myself consciously to
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the Great Work, understanding thereby the Work of becoming a
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Spiritual Being, free from the constraints, accidents, and deceptions
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of material existence.
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I found myself at a loss for a name to designate my work, just
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as H.P. Blavatsky some years earlier. "Theosophy", "Spiritua-
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lism", "Occultism", "Mysticism", all involved undesirable con-
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notations.
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I chose therefore the name.
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"MAGICK"
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as essentially the most sublime, and actually the most discredited,
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of all the available terms.
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I swore to rehabilitate
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MAGICK,
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to identify it with my own career; and to compel mankind to
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respect, love, and trust that which they scorned, hated and feared.
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I have kept my Word.
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But the time is now come for me to carry my banner into the
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thick of the press of human life.
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I must make
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MAGICK
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the essential factor in the life of
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ALL.
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In presenting this book to the world, I must then explain and
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justify my position by formulating a definition of
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MAGICK
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and setting forth its main principles in such a way that
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ALL
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may understand instantly that their souls, their lives, in every
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relation with every other human being and every circumstance,
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depend upon
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MAGICK
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and the right comprehension and right application thereof.
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I. DEFINITION.
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MAGICK
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is the Science and Art of causing Change to occur in confor-
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mity with Will.
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( Illustration: It is my Will to inform the World of certain facts
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within my knowledge. I therfore take "magical weapons", pen,
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ink, and paper; I write "incantations" --these sentences-- in the
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"magical language" i.e. that which is understood by the people I
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wish to instruct; I call forth "spirits", such as printers, publishers,
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booksellers, and so forth, and constrain them to convey my message
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to those people. The composition and distribution of this book is
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thus an act of
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MAGICK
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by which I cause Changes to take place in conformity with my
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Will) *By "intentional" I mean "willed". But even unintentional act
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so-seeming are not truly so. Thus, breathing is an act of the Will-
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to-Live.*
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II. POSTULATE.
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ANY required Change may be effected by the application
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of the proper kind and degree of Force in the proper
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manner through the proper medium to the proper object.
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( Illustration: I wish to prepare an ounce of Chloride of Gold.
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I must take the right kind of acid, nitro-hydrochloric and no other,
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in sufficient quantity and of adequate strength, and place it, in a
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vessel which will not break, leak, or corrode, in such a manner as
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will not produce undesirable results, with the necessary quantity
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of Gold: and so forth. Every Change has its own conditions.
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In the present state of our knowledge and power some changes
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are not possible in practice; we cannot cause eclipses, for instance,
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or transform lead into tin, or create men from mushrooms. But it
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is theoretically possible to cause in any object any change of which
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that object is capable by nature; and the conditions are covered by
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the above postulate.)
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III. THEOREMS.
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(1) Every intentional act is a Magical Act. *In one sense Magick
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may be defined as the name given to Science by the vulgar.*
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(Illustration: See "Definition" above.)
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(2) Every successful act has conformed to the postulate.
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(3) Every failure proves that one or more requirements
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of the postulate have not been fulfilled.
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( Illustrations: There may be failure to understand the case; as
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when a doctor makes a wrong diagnosis, and his treatment injures
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his patient. There may be failure to apply the right kind of
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force, as when a rustic tries to blow out an electric light. There
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may be failure to apply the right degree of force, as when a
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wrestler has his hold broken. There may be failure to apply the
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force in the right manner, as when one presents a cheque at the
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wrong window of the Bank. There may be failure to employ the
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correct medium, as when Leonardo da Vinci found his masterpiece
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fade away. The force may be applied to an unsuitable object, as
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when one tries to crack a stone, thinking it a nut.)
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(4) The first requisite for causing any change is
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thorough qualitative and quantitative understanding of the
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conditions.
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(Illustration: The most common cause of failure in life is
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ignorance of one's own True Will, or of the means by which to
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fulfil that Will. A man may fancy himself a painter, and waste
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his life trying to become one; or he may be really a painter, and
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yet fail to understand and to measure the difficulties peculiar to
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that carrier.)
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(5) The second requisite of causing any change is the
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practical ability to set in right motion the necessary forces.
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(Illustration: A banker may have a perfect grasp of a given
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situation, yet lack the quality of decision, or the assets, necessary
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to take advantage of it.)
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(6) "Every man and every woman is a star". That is to
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say, every human being is intrinsically an independent individual
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with his own proper character and proper motion.
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(7) Every man and every woman has a course, depending
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partly on the self, and partly on the environment which is
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natural and necessary for each. Anyone who is forced from
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his own course, either through not understanding himself,
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or through external opposition, comes into conflict with the
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order of the Universe, and suffers accordingly.
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(Illustration: A man may think it his duty to act in a certain way,
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through having made a fancy picture of himself, instead of
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investigating his actual nature. For example, a woman may make
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herself miserable for life by thinking that she prefers love to
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social concideration, or visa versa. One woman may stay with an
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unsympathetic husband when she would really be happy in an attic
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with a lover, while another may fool herself into a romantic
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elopment when her only true pleasures are those of presiding at
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fashionable functions. Again, a boy's instinct may tell him to go
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to sea, while his parents insist on his becoming a doctor. In such
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a case, he will be both unsuccessful and unhappy in medicine.)
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(8) A man whose conscious will is at odds with his True
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Will is wasting his strength. He cannot hope to influence
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his environment efficiently.
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(Illustration: When Civil War rages in a nation, it is in no
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condition to undertake the invasion of other countries. A man
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with cancer employs his nourishment alike to his own use and to
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that of the enemy which is a part of himself. He soon fails to resist
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the pressure of his environment. In practical life, a man who is
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doing what his conscience tells him to be wrong will do it very
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clumsily. At first!)
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(9) A man who is doing his True Will has the enertia of
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the Universe to assist him.
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(Illustration: The first principle of success in evolution is that
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the individual should be true to his own nature, and at the same
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time adaot himself to his environment.)
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(10) Nature is a continuous phenomenon, though we
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do not know in all cases how things are connected.
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(Illustration: Human consciousness depends on the properties of
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protoplasm, the existence of which depends on innumerable physical
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conditions peculiar to this planet; and this planet is determined by
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the mechanical balance of the whole universe of matter. We may
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then say that our consciousness is causally connected with the
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remotest galaxies; yet we do not know even how it arises from--
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or with--the molecular changes in the brain.)
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(11) Science enables us to take advantage of the contin-
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uity of Nature by the empirical application of certain
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principles whose interplay involves different orders of idea
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connected with each other in a way beyond our present comprehension.
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(Illustration: We are able to light cities by rule-of-thumb
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methods. We do not know what consciousness is, or how it is
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connected with muscular action; what electricity is or how it is
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connected with the machines that generate it; and our methods
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depend on calculation involving mathematical ideas which have
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no correspondence in the Universe as we know it.) *For instance,
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"irrational", "unreal", and "infinite" expressions.*
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(12) Man is igmorant of the nature of his own being and
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powers. Even his idea of his limitations is based on
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experience of the past, and every step in his progress
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extends his empire. There is therefore no reason to assign
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theoretical limits to what he may be, or to what he may do.
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*i.e., except--possibly--in the case of logically absurd questions,
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such as the Schoolmen discussed in connection with "God".*
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(Illustration: A generation ago it was supposed theoretically
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inpossible that man should ever know the chemical composition of
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the fixed stars. It is known that our senses are adapted to receive
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only an infinitesimal fraction of the possible rates of vibration.
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Modern instruments have enabled us to detect some of these supra-
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sensibles by indirect methods, and even to use their peculiar qualities
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in the service of man, as in the case of the rays of Hertz and
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Rontgen. As Tyndall said, man might at any moment learn to
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perceive and utilise vibrations of all conceivable and inconceivable
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kinds. The question of Magick is a question of discovering and
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employing hitherto unknown forces in nature. We know that they
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exist, and we cannot doubt the possibility of mental or physical
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instruments capable of bringing us into relation with them.)
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(13) Every man is more or less aware that his individu-
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ality comprises severa l orders of existence, even when he
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maintains that his subtler principles are merely symptomatic
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of the changes in his gross vehicle. A similar order may be
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assumed to extend throughout nature.
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(Illustration: One does not confuse the pain of toothache with
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the decay which causes it. Inanimate objects are sensitive to
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certain ohysical forces, such as electrical and thermal conductivity;
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but neither in us nor in them--so far as we know--is there any
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direct conscious perception of these forces. Imperceptible influences
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are therefore associated with all material phenomena; and there
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is no reason why we should not work upon matter through those
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subtle energies as we do through their material bases. In fact, we
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use magnetic force to move iron, and solar radiation to reproduce
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images.)
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(14) Man is capable of being, and using, anything which
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he perceives, for everything that he perceives is in a certain
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sense a part of his being. He may thus subjugate the whole
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Universe of which he is conscious to his individual Will.
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(Illustration: Man has used the idea of God to dictate his
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personal conduct, to obtain power over his fellows, to excuse his
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crimes, and for innumerable other purposes, including that of
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realizing himself as God. He has used the irrational and unreal
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conceptions of mathematics to help him in the construction of
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mechanical devices. He has used his moral force to influence the
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actions even of wild animals. He has employed poetic genius for
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political purposes.)
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(15) Every force in the Universe is capable of being
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transformed into any other kind of force by using suitable
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means. There is thus an inexhaustible supply of any
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particular kind of force that we may need.
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(Illustration: Heat may be transformed into light and power by
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using it to drive dynamos. The vibrations of the air may be used
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to kill men by so ordering them in speech as to inflame war-like
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passions. The hallucinations connected with the mysterious
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energies of sex result in the perpetuation of the species.)
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(16) The application of any given force affects all the
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orders of being which exist in the object to which it is
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applied, whichever of those orders is directly affected.
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(Illustration: If I strike a man with a dagger, his consciousness,
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not his body only, is affected by my act; although the dagger, as
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such, has no direct relation therewith. Similarly, the power of
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my thought may so work on the mind of another person as to
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produce far-reaching physical changes in him, or in others through
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him.)
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(17) A man may learn to use any force so as to serve
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any purpose, by taking advantage of the above theorems.
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(Illustration: A man may use a razor to make himself vigilant
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over his speech, by using it to cut himself whenevr he unguardedly
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utters a chosen word. He may serve the same purpose by resolving
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that every incident of his life shall remind him of a particular thing,
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making every impression the starting point of a connected series of
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thoughts ending in that thing. He might also devote his whole
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energies to some one particular object, by resolving to do nothing
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at variance therewith, and to make every act turn to the advantage
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of that object.)
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(18) He may attract to himself any force of the Universe
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by making himself a fit receptacle for it, establishing a
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connection with it, and arranging conditions so that its
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nature compels it to flow toward him.
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(Illustration: If I want pure water to drink, I dig a well in a
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place where there is underground water; I prevent it from leaking
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away; and I arrange to take advantage of water's accordance with
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the laws of Hydrostatics to fill it.)
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(19) Man's sense of himself as seperate from, and
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opposed to, the Universe is a bar to his conducting its
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currents. It insulates him.
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(Illustration: A popular leader is most successful when he
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forgets himself, and remembers only "The Cause". Self-seeking
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engenders jealousies and schism. When the organs of the body
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assert their presence otherwise than by silent satisfaction, it is a
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sign that they are diseased. The single exception is the organ of
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reproduction. Yet even in this case its self-assertion bears witness
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to its dissatisfaction with itself, since it cannot fulfil its function
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until completed by its counterpart in another organism.)
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(20) Man can only attract and employ the forces for
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which he is really fitted.
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(Illustration: You cannot make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. A
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true man of science learns from every phenomenon. But Nature
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is dumb to the hypocrite; for in her ther is nothing false.)
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*It is no objection that the hypocrite is himself a part of Nature. He
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is an "endothermic" product, divided against itself, with a tendency to
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break up. He will see his own qualities everywhere, and thus obtain a
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radical misconception of phenomena. Most religions of the past have
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failed by expecting Nature to conform with their ideals of proper
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conduct.*
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(21) There is no limit to the extent of the relations of
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any man with the Universe in essence; for as soon as man
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makes himself one with any idea the means of measurement
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cease to exist. But his power to utilize that force is limited
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by his mantal power and capacity, and by the circumstances
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of his human environment.
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(Illustration: When a man falls in love, the whole world
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becomes, to him, nothing but love boundless and immanent; but
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his mystical state is not contagious; his fellow-men are either
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amused or annoyed. He can only extend to others the effect which
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his love has had upon himself by means of his mental and physical
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qualities. Thus, Catullus, Dante and Swinburne made their love a
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mighty mover of mankind by virtue of their power to put their
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thoughts on the subject in musical and eloquent language. Again,
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Cleopatra and other people in authority moulded the fortunes of
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many other people by allowing love to influence their political
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actions. The Magician, however well he succeed in making contact
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with the secret sources of energy in nature, can only use them to the
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extent permitted by his intellectual and moral qualities.
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Mohammed's intercourse with Gabriel was only effective because
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of his statesmanship, soldiership, and the sublimity of his command
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of Arabic. Hertz's discovery of the rays which we now use for
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wireless telepathy was sterile until reflected through the minds
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and wills of people who could take his truth, and transmit it
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to the world of action by means of mechanical and economic
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instruments.)
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(22) Every individual is essentially sufficient to himself.
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But he is unsatisfactory to himself until he has established
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himself in his right relation with the Universe.
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(Illustration: A microscope, however perfect, is useless in the
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hands of savages. A poet, however sublime, must impose himself
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upon his generation if he is to enjoy (and even understand)
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himself, as theoretically should be the case.)
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(23) Magick is the Science of understanding oneself and
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one's conditions. It is the Art of applying that under-
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standing in action.
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(Illustration: A golf club is intended to move a special ball in a
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special way in special circumstances. A Niblick should rarely be
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used on the tee, or a Brassie under the bank of a bunker. But
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also, the use of any club demands skill and experience.)
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|
||
(24) Every man has an indefeasable right to be what he is.
|
||
(Illustration: To insist that any one else shall comply with one's
|
||
own standards is to outrage, not only him, but oneself, since both
|
||
parties are equally born of necessity.)
|
||
|
||
(25) Every man must do Magick each time he acts or
|
||
even thinks, since a thought is an internal act whose
|
||
influence ultimately affects action, though it may not do
|
||
so at the time.
|
||
(Illustration: The least gesture causes in a man's own
|
||
body and in the air around him; it disturbs the balance of the
|
||
entire Universe, and its effects continue eternally throughout all
|
||
space. Every thought, however swiftly suppressed, has its effect
|
||
on the mind. It stands as one of the causes of every subsequent
|
||
thought, and tends to influence every subsequent action. A golfer
|
||
may lose a few yards on his drive, a few more with his second and
|
||
third, he may lie on the green six bare inches too far from the hole;
|
||
but the net result of these trifling mishaps is the difference of a
|
||
whole stroke, and so probably between halving and losing the
|
||
hole.)
|
||
|
||
(26) Every man has a right, the right of self-preserva-
|
||
tion, to fulfil himself to the utmost. *Men of "criminal nature" are
|
||
simply at issue with their True Wills. The murderer has the Will-to
|
||
-Live; and his will to murder is a false will at variance with his
|
||
true Will, since he risks death at the hands of Society by obeying
|
||
his criminat impulse*
|
||
(Illustration: A function imperfectly performed injures, not
|
||
only itself, but everything associated with it. If the heart is afraid
|
||
to beat for fear of disturbing the liver, the liver is starved for
|
||
blood, and avenges itself on the heart by upsetting digestion, which
|
||
disorders respiration, on which cardiac welfare depends.)
|
||
|
||
(27) Every man should make Magick the keynote of his
|
||
life. He should learn its laws and live by them.
|
||
(Illustration: The Banker should discover the real meaning of
|
||
his existence, the real motive which led him to choose that profes-
|
||
sion. He should understand banking as a necessary factor in the
|
||
economic existence of mankind, instead of as merely a business
|
||
whose objects are independent of the general welfare. He should
|
||
learn to distinguish false values from real, and to act not on
|
||
accidental fluctuations but on considerations of essential impor-
|
||
tance. Such a banker will prove himself superior to others; because
|
||
he will not be an indivudual limited by transitory things, but a
|
||
force of Nature, as impersonal, impartial and eternal as gravitation,
|
||
as patient and irresistible as the tides. His system will not be
|
||
subject to panic, any more than the law of Inverse Squares is
|
||
disturbed by Elections. He will not be anxious about his affairs
|
||
because they will not be his; and for that reason he will be able to
|
||
direct them with the calm, clear-headed confidence of an onlooker,
|
||
with intelligence unclouded by self-interes and power unimpaired
|
||
by passion.)
|
||
|
||
(28) Every man has a right to fulfil his own will without
|
||
being afraid that it may interfere with that of others; for
|
||
if he is in his proper place, it is the fault of others if they
|
||
interfere with him.
|
||
(Illustration: If a man like Napoleon were actually appointed
|
||
by destiny to control Europe, he should not be blamed for
|
||
exercising his rights. To oppose him would be an error. Any
|
||
one so doing would have made a mistake as to his own destiny,
|
||
except in so far as it might be necessary for him to learn the
|
||
lessons of defeat. The sun moves in space without interference.
|
||
The order of Nature provides an orbit for each star. A clash
|
||
proves that one or the other has strayed from its course. But as
|
||
to each man that keeps his true course, the more firmly he acts, the
|
||
less likely are others to get in his way. His example will help
|
||
them to find their own paths and pursue them. Every man that
|
||
becomes a Magician helps others to do likewise. The more firmly
|
||
and surely men move, and the more such action is excepted as the
|
||
standard of morality, the less will conflict and confusion hamper
|
||
humanity.)
|
||
----------
|
||
|
||
I hope that the above principles will demonstrate to
|
||
ALL
|
||
that their welfare, their very existence, is bound up in
|
||
MAGICK.
|
||
I trust that they will understand, not only the reasonableness, but
|
||
the necessity of the fundamental truth which I was the means of
|
||
giving to mankind:
|
||
"Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law."
|
||
I trust that they will assert themselves as individually absolute, that
|
||
they will grasp the fact that it is their right to assert themselves, and
|
||
to accomplish the task for which their nature fits them. Yea, more,
|
||
that this is their duty, and that not only to themselves but to
|
||
others, a duty founded upon universal necessity, and not to be
|
||
shirked on account of any casual circumstances of the moment which
|
||
may seem to put such contact in the light of inconvenience or even
|
||
of cruelty.
|
||
I hope that the principles outlined above will help them to
|
||
understand this book, and prevent them from being dettered from
|
||
its study by the more or less technical language in which it is
|
||
written.
|
||
The essence of
|
||
MAGICK
|
||
is simple enough in all conscience. It is not otherwise with the art
|
||
of goverment. The Aim is simply prosperity; but the theory is
|
||
tangled, and the practice beset with briars.
|
||
In the same way
|
||
MAGICK
|
||
is merely to be and to do. I should add: "to suffer". For Magick
|
||
is the verb; and it is part of the Training to use the passive voice.
|
||
This is, however, a matter of Initiation rather than of Magick in
|
||
its ordinary sense. It is not my fault if being is baffling, and doing
|
||
desperate!
|
||
Yet, once the above principles are firmly fixed in the mind, it is
|
||
easy enough to sum up the situation very shortly. One must
|
||
find out for oneself, and make sure beyond doubt, WHO one is, WHAT
|
||
one is, WHY one is. This done, one may put the Will which is
|
||
implicit in the "Why" into words, or rather into One Word. Being
|
||
thus conscious of the proper course to pursue, the next thing is to
|
||
understand the conditions necessary to following it out. After
|
||
that, one must eliminate from oneself every element alien or
|
||
hostile to success, and develop those parts of oneself which are
|
||
specially needed to control the aforesaid conditions.
|
||
Let us make an analogy. A nation must become aware of its
|
||
own character before it can be said to exist. From that knowledge
|
||
it must divine its destiny. It must then consider the political
|
||
conditions of the world; how other countries may help it or hinder
|
||
iy. It must then destroy in itself any elements discordant with its
|
||
destiny. Lastly, it must develop in itself those qualities which will
|
||
enable it to combat successfully the external conditions which
|
||
threaten to oppose its purpose. We have had a recent example in
|
||
the case of the young German Empire, which, knowing itself and
|
||
its will, disciplined and trained itself so that it conquered the
|
||
neighbors which had oppressed it for so many centuries. But
|
||
after 1866 and 1870, 1914! It mistook itself for superhuman, it
|
||
willed a thing impossible, it failed to eliminate its own internal
|
||
jealousies, it failed to understand the conditions of victory, it did
|
||
not train itself to hold the sea, and thus, having violated every
|
||
principle of
|
||
MAGICK,
|
||
it was pulled down and broken into pieces by provincialism and
|
||
democracy, so that neither individual excellence nor civic virtue
|
||
has yet availed to raise it again to that majestic unity which made
|
||
so bold a bid for the mastery of the race of man.*At least it allowed
|
||
England to discover its intentions, and so to combine the world against
|
||
it.*
|
||
The sincere student will discover, behind the symbolic techni-
|
||
calities of this book, a practical method of making himself a
|
||
Magician. The processes described will enable him to discriminate
|
||
between what he actually is, and what he has fondly imagined
|
||
himself to be. *Proffesor Sigmund Freud and his school have, in recent
|
||
years, discovered a part of this body of Truth, which has been taught
|
||
for many centuries in the Sanctuaries of Initiation. But failure to
|
||
grasp the fullness of Truth, especially that implied in my Sixth
|
||
Theorem (above) and its corollaries, has led him and his followers into
|
||
the error of admitting that the avowedly suicidal "Censor" is the proper
|
||
arbiter of conduct. Official psycho-analysis is therefore committed to
|
||
upholding a fraud, although the foundation of the science was the
|
||
observation of the disastrous effects on the individual of being false
|
||
to his Unconscious Self, whose "writting on the wall" in dream language
|
||
is the record of the sum of the essential tendencies of the true nature
|
||
of the individual. The result has been that psycho-analysts have
|
||
misinterprted life, and announced the absurdity that every human being
|
||
is essentially an anti-social, criminal, and insane animal. It is
|
||
evident that the errors of the Unconscious of which the psycho-analysts
|
||
complain are neither more nor less than the "original sin" of the
|
||
theologians whom they despise so heartily.* He must behold his soul in
|
||
all its awful nakedness, he must not fear to look on that appalling
|
||
actuality. He must discard the gaudy garments with which shame has
|
||
screened him; he must accept the fact that nothing can make him
|
||
anything but what he is. He may lie to himself, drug himself,
|
||
hide himself; but he is always there. Magick will teach him that
|
||
his mind is playing him a traitor. It is as if a man were told that
|
||
tailors' fashion-plates were the canon of human beauty, so
|
||
that he tried to make himself formless and featureless like them,
|
||
and shuddered with horror at the idea of Holbein making a portrait
|
||
of him. Magick will show him the beauty and majesty of the self
|
||
which he has tried to suppress and disguise.
|
||
Having discovered his identity, he will soon perceive his purpose.
|
||
Another process will show him how to make that purpose pure
|
||
and powerful. He may then learn how to estimate his environ-
|
||
ment, learn how to make allies, how to make himself prevail against
|
||
all powers whose error has caused them to wander across his path.
|
||
In the course of this Training, he will learn to explore the
|
||
Hidden-Mysteries of Nature, and to develop new senses and
|
||
faculties in himself, whereby he may communicate with, and
|
||
control, Beings and Forces pertaining to orders of existence which
|
||
have been hitherto inaccessible to profane research, and available
|
||
only to that unscientific and emperical
|
||
MAGICK
|
||
(of tradition) which I came to destroy in order that I might fulifil.
|
||
I send this book into the world that every man and woman may
|
||
take hold of life in the proper manner. It does not matter if
|
||
one's present house of flesh be the hut of a shepherd; by virtue
|
||
of my
|
||
MAGICK
|
||
he shall be such a shepherd as David was. If it be the studio of a
|
||
sculptor, he shall so chisel from himself the marble that masks his
|
||
idea that he shall be no less a master than Rodin.
|
||
Witness mine hand:
|
||
TO MEGA THERION (in Greek) (zayin, vav, yod, resh tav): The Beast 666;
|
||
MAGUS 9=2 A.'. A.'. who is The Word of the Aeon THELEMA;
|
||
whose name is called V.V.V.V.V. 8=3 A.'. A.'. in the City of
|
||
the Pyramids; OU MH 7=4; OL SONUF VAORESAGI 6=5, and ..... ..... 5=6
|
||
A.'. A.'. in the Mountain of Abeignus: but FRATER PERDUABO in the Outer
|
||
Order or the A.'. A.'. and in the World of men upon the Earth, Alleiter
|
||
Crowley of Trinity College, Cambridge.
|
||
|
||
|