59
You
will cease
to
be
interested
in
controversies;
politics,
ethics,
religion
will
seem
so
many toys,
and
your
Magical
Will
will
be
free
from these inhibitions.
In
Burma
there
is
only
one
animal
which
the
people
will
kill,
Russell's
Viper;
because,
as they
say, "either you
must kill
it or it will
kill you";
and it is a question
of which
sees the other first.
Now
any one
idea
which
is
not
The
Idea must
be treated
in
this
fashion.
When you
have killed
the
snake
you
can use its skin,
but as
long
as it is alive and free, you are in danger.
And
unfortunately
the ego-idea,
which
is the real snake,
can
throw
itself into
a multitude
of forms,
each clothed
in the most brilliant dress.
Thus
the
devil
is
said
to
be
able
to
disguise
himself
as
an
angel
of light.
Under
the strain of a magical
vow
this
is too terribly
the case.
No
normal
human
being
understands
or can understand
the temptations
of
the saints.
An ordinary person
with
ideas like those which
obsessed
St. Patrick
and St. Antony would be only
fit for an asylum.
The
tighter
you hold the snake
(which
was
previously
asleep
in the
sun, and harmless enough,
to all appearance),
the more it struggles : and
it
is important
to remember
that
your
hold
must
tighten
correspond-
ingly,
or it will escape and bite you.