Magick in Theory and Practice (Section 1)

third part; in which occur, almost as if by accident, the words: ‘‘Therefore do ail things obey my word.” Yet in the fourth part, which begins: “Therefore do thou corne forth unto me”, it is not really the magician who is addressing the God; it is the God who hears the far-off utterance of the magician. If this invocation has been correctly performed, the words of the fourth part will Sound distant and strange. It is surprising that a dummy (so the magus now appears to Himself) should be able to speak! The Egyptian Gods are so complété in their nature, so perfectly spiritual and yet so perfectly material, that this one invocation is sufficient. The God bethinks him that the spirit of Mercury should now appear to the magician; and it is so. This Egyptian formula is therefore to be preferred to the Hierarchical formula of the Hebrews with its tedious prayers, conjurations, and curses. It will be noted, however, that in this invocation of Thoth which we hâve summârized, there is another formula contained, the Reverberating or Reciprocating formula, which may be called the formula of Horus and Harpocrates. The magician addresses the God with an active projection of nis will, and then becomes passive while the God addresses the Universe. In the fourth part he remains silent, listening, to the prayer which arises therefrom. The formula of this invocation of Thoth may also be classed under Tetragrammaton. The first part is fire, the eager prayer of the magician, the second water, in which the magician°listens to, or catches the reflection of, the god. The third part is air, the marriage of fire and water; the god and the man hâve become one; while the fourth part corresponds to earth, the condensa¬ tion 01 matenalization of those three highcr principles. With regard to the Hebrew formulae, it is doubtful whether inost magicians who use them hâve ever properly grasped the principles underlying the method of identity. No passage which împlies it occurs to mind, and the extant ntuais certainly give no hmt of such a conception, or of any but the most personal and material views of the nature of things. They seem to hâve thought that there was an Archangel named Ratziel in exactly the same sense as there was a statesman named Richelieu, an individual being living in a definite place. Eté had possibly certain powers of a somewhat metaphysical order—he might be — 19 —