The Law is for All

Introduction 17 phenomenally swift and operative in its creative force as the evil growths of the present century have been phenomenally swift and operative in their force of destruction. We today need The Book of the Law for our guidance, for our strength, for our happiness and fulfilment. It is because I am con­ vinced that we need it, and need it very badly, that I have made this attempt to abridge the Commentary upon it by removing passages likely to present obstructive difficulties to the general reader, to the layman like myself. I have aimed at making an abridgement that the general reader of intelligence and good will can assimilate, and by which he will powerfully gain. But I do not pretend that he will understand this Book and make it his own without any difficulty at all; it is only charlatan works that can be so quickly and easily grasped as that. It is impossible to write rewardingly on such matters as religion, death, sex, the conduct of life, and at the same time to make no more than slight and sim­ ple demands on the reader’s brain. Unless he makes the effort not only to attend but to cooperate, no one can gain anything of importance from any book. The gain that the reader will get from this book will be prima­ rily religious. For the “Law” is in its essence a religious Law; its sanctions, its injunctions, and its prohibitions are religious. At the same time it is not a dogmatic religion in the sense in which most religions are dogmatic; it is a Faith for the individualist, as is clearly shown by its central text, “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.” “Discover your own true will,” is the mean- L40 ing of this; “and then act in harmony with it to the utmost of your powers.” The aim of the Commentary on the Book of the Law is to guide the reader along the path of the discovery of his own true will, in accordance with which, and only in accordance with which, he can rightly think and act. This is why “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.” Only by so doing will you be shown your own true thought and life. “Every man and every woman is a star.” A separate star; and 1:3 indeed, in a sense which is explained in this book, a separate god. The herd-instinct defiles and destroys the godhead in man. “Democracy,” at least in some of its contemporary influences,