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I feel that I am more likely to be able to convey some hint of the colossal character of this 
revelation if I simply quote the broken staggering words in which I wrote it down at the time. As will 
be seen, I did not dare to write what it actually was, but I remember at this moment how I had to 
invoke 
{839} 
the deep-seated habit of years to get courage to drag myself to my diary. I felt like a soldier 
wounded to death, scrawling in his own blood the horrifyingly disastrous information which he has 
lost his life in seeking. 
5:00 p.m. The meditation of this afternoon resulted in an initiation so stupendous that I dare not 
hint at its Word. It is the supreme secret of a Magus, and its is so awful that I tremble even now --- 
two hours later and more --- 2:20 p.m. was the time --- as I write concerning it. In a single instant I 
had the Key to the whole of the Chinese wisdom. In the light --- momentary glimpse as it was --- of 
this truth, all systems of religion and philosophy became absolutely puerile. Even the Law appears 
no more than a curious incident. I remain absolutely bewildered, blinded, knowing what blasting 
image lies in this shrine. It baffles me to understand how my brother Magi, knowing this, ever went 
on. 
I had only one foreshadowing of this Vision of Jupiter --- for so I may call it! --- and that was a 
Samadhi which momentarily interrupted my concentration of Sammasati. This can only be described 
vaguely by saying that I obtained a reconciliation of two contraries of which "There is a 
discrimination between good and evil" is one. 
This experience has shaken me utterly; it has been a terrible struggle to force myself to this record. 
The secret comes along the Path of Aleph to Chokmah. I could write it plainly in a few words of one 
syllable, and most people would not even notice it.1 But it has might to hurl every Master of the 
Temple into the Abyss, and to fling every adept of the Rose Cross down to the Qliphoth. No wonder 
One said that the Book T was in ashes in the Urn of a Magus! I can't see at all how it will affect me 
at present. Even the Way of the Tao looks idiotic --- but then of course that's what it is! So I suppose 
that's it, all right. And its freedom, in an utterly fascinating and appalling sense, is beyond my 
fiercest conception. 
An experience of this intensity demands a period of repose, no less than a boat race or any other 
form of intense effort. The adepts have always insisted on due preparation for any initiation. As The 
Book of the Law says, "... Wisdom says: be strong! Then canst thou bear more joy. ..." I accordingly 
broke up my camp after a few days' holiday from magical work, and returned to New York. 
The next period is strangely confused. It was as if I were left in the Desert with no idea of direction 
and surrounded by a series of mirages. Innumerable people came into my life and passed out again, 
without leaving any trace. 
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1. I find that I wrote it down plainly seventeen years ago! But I had no 
conception of its terror --- one must be a Magus to get that!  
The fact was that none of the people appointed by Amalantrah to various tasks were willing to 
undertake them. It may well be that this was due to a lack of real faith on my part. The 
communications from the Wizard had become confused and even contradictory. I had failed to 
understand his plan and to acquiesce unreservedly in it. This weakness of mine naturally reacted on 
the other people concerned. 
Only one clear duty lay before me. The five years of silence which were to follow the publication of 
number 10 of The Equinox were at an end. I therefore devoted myself to planning another ten 
numbers, beginning at the spring equinox of 1919. I had an immense amount of material ready for 
publication. The one critical omission was the comment on The Book of the Law, which I had