Magick in Theory and Practice (Section 1)

most important is the bell \ though this is used not so much for actual conjuration as to mark stages in the ceremony. Of ail these the tom-tom will be found to be the most generally useful. While on the subject of barbarous names of évocation we should not omit the utterance of certain suprême words which enshrine (a) the complété formula of the God invoked, or (3 the whole ceremony. Examples of the former kind are Tetragrammaton, I.A.O., and Abrahadabra. An example of the latter kind is the great Word StiBeTTChe- PhMeFSHiSS, which is a line drawn on the Tree of Life (Coptic attributions) in a certain manner.1 2 With ail such words it is of the utmost importance that they should never be spoken until the suprême moment, and even then they should burst from the magician almost despite himself — so great should be his réluctance 3 to utter them. In fact, they should be the utterance of the God in him at the first onset of the divine possession. So uttered, they cannot fail of effect, for they hâve become the effect. Every wise magician will hâve constructed (according to the principles of the Holy Qabalah) many such words, and he should hâve quintessentialised them ail in one Word, which last Word, once he has formed it, he should never utter consciously even in thought, until perhaps with it he gives up the ghost. Such a Word should in fact be so potent that man cannot hear it and live. 1. See Part II. It should be said that in expérience no bell save His own Tibetan bell of Electrum Magicum has ever sounded satisfactory to the Master Therion. Most bells jar and repel. 2. It represents the descent of a certain Influnce. See the Evocation of Taphtatharath, Equinox I, III. The attributions are given in 777. This Word expresses the current Kether - Beth - Binah - Cheth - Geburch - Mem - Hod - Shin - Malkuth, the descent from 1 to 10 via the Pillar of Severity. 3. This réluctance is Freudian, due to the power of these words to awaken the suppressed subconscious libido. — 70 —