Berashith

22 Meditation is not within the reach of every one ; not all possess the ability; very few indeed (in the west at least) have’ the opportunity, In any case what the Easterns call “one-pointedness”” is an essential preliminary to even early stages of true meditation. And iron will-power is a still earlier qualifi- cation. By meditation I do not mean merely “thinking about” anything, however profoundly, but the absolute restraint of the mind to the contemplation of a single object, whether gross, fine, or altogether spiritual. Now true magical ceremonial is entirely directed to attain this end, and forms a magnificent gymnasium for those who are not already finished mental athletes. By act, word, and thought, both in quantity and quality, the one object of the ceremony is being constantly indicated. Every fumigation, purification, banishing, invocation, evocation, is chiefly a reminder of the single purpose, until the supreme moment arrives and every fibre of the body, every force-channel of the mind, is strained out in one. overwhelming rush of the Will in the direction desired. Such is the real purport of all the apparently fantastic directions of Solomon, Abramelin, and other sages of repute. When a man has evoked and mastered such forces as Taphtartarath, Belial, Amaimon, and the great powers of the elements, then he may safely be permitted to begin to try to stop thinking. For, needless to say, the universe, including the thinker, exists only by virtue of the thinker’s thought.