Magick in Theory and Practice (Section 1)

When this “loss of face” does not occur, distrust the accuracy of the item which you recall. The only reliable recollections* which présent themselves with serenity are invariably connected with what men call disasters. Instead of the feeling of being caught in the slips, one has that of being missed at the wicket. One has the sly satisfaction of having done an outrageously foolish thing and got off scot free. When one sees life in perspective, it is an immense relief to discover that things like bankruptcy, wedlock, and the gallows made no particular différence. They were only accidents such as might happen to anybody; they had no real bearing on the point at issue. One consequently remembers having one’s ears cropped as a lucky escape, while the casual jest of a drunken skeinsmate in an all-night café stings one with the shame of the parvenu to whom a poli te stranger has unsuspectingly mentioned “Mine Uncle”. The testimony of intuitions is, however, strictly subjective, and shrieks for collateral security. It would be a great error to ask too much. In conséquence of the peculiar character of the recol¬ lections which are under the microscope, anything in the shape of gross confirmation almost présumés per jury. A pathologist would arouse suspicion if he said that his bacilli had arranged themselves on the slide so as to spell Staphylococcus. We distrust an arrange¬ ment of flowers which tells us that “Life is worth living in Detroit, Michigan”. Suppose that Aleister Crowley remembers that he was Sir Edward Kelly. It does not follow that he will be able to give us details of Cracow in the time of James I of» England. Material events are the words of an arbitrary languagej the symbols of a cipher previously agreed on. What happened to Kelly in Cracow may hâve meant something to him, but there is no reason to présumé that it has any meaning for his successor. There is an obvious line of criticism about any recollection. It must not clash with ascertained facts. F or example one cannot hâve two lives which overlap, unless there is reason to suppose that the earlier died spiritually before his body ceased to breathe. This might happen in certain cases, such as insanity. It is not conclusive against a previous incarnation that the présent should be inferior to the past. One’s life may represent the full possibilities of a certain partial Karma. One may hâve 55