The Vision and the Voice

THE EQUINOX not fall; for my plumes reach up unto the Knees of Him that sitteth upon the holy throne, and liveth and reigneth for ever and ever as the balance of righteousness and truth. I am the Angel of the moon. I am the veiled one that sitteth between the pillars veiled with a shining veil, and on my lap is the open Book of the mysteries of the ineffable light. Iam the aspiration unto the higher; I am the love of the unknown. I am the blind ache within the heart of man. I am the minister of the sacrament of pain. I swing the censer of worship, and I sprinkle the waters of purification. I am the daughter of the house of the invisible. I am the Priestess of the Silver Star. And she catches me up to her as a mother catches her babe, and holds me up in her left arm, and sets my lips to her breast. And upon her breast is written: Rosa Mundi est Lilium Coeli. And I look down upon the open Book of the mysteries, and it is open at the page on which is the Holy Table with the twelve squares in the midst. It radiates a blaze of light, too dazzling to make out the characters, and a voice says: Non haec piscis omnium. (To interpret that, we must think of “Ixus, which does not conceal Jesous Christos Theon Utos Sotery as traditionally asserted, but is a mystery of the letter Nun and the letter Qoph, as may be seen by adding it up. Ixus is only connected with Christianity because it was a hieroglyph of syphilis, which the Romans supposed to have been brought from Syria; and it seems to have been con- founded with leprosy, which also they thought was caused by fish-eating. 50