Diary of a Drug Fiend

Love under Will 361 But I have certainly always been put off by the idea of ceremonial or ritual of any kind. There again, Basil’s ideas are fantastically different to other people’s. He says ; what about the forms and ceremonies used in an electric light plant ? I gave a little jump when he made the remark. It was so. destructive of all my ideas. “‘ Most ritual,” he agreed, “ is vain observance, but if there is such a thing as the so-called spiritual force in man, it requires to be generated, collected, controlled, and applied, by using the appropriate measures, and these form true ritual.” And, in fact, the weird ceremony in progress in his Titan tower produced a definite effect upon me, unintelligible as it was to me for the most part, on one hand, and repellent as it was to my Protestant instincts on the other. I could not help being struck by the first of the collects. ‘“‘ Lord visible and sensible, of whom this earth is but a frozen spark turning about thee with annual and diurnal motion, source of light, source of life, source of liberty, let thy perpetual radiance hearten us to con- tinual labour and enjoyment ; so that as we are constant partakers of thy bounty we may in our particular orbit give out light and life, sustenance and joy to them that revolve about us without diminution of substance or effulgence for ever.” The words were full of the deepest religious feeling and vibrated with a mysterious exultation, and yet the most hardened materialist could not have objected to a single idea. Again, after an invocation of the forces of birth and reproduction, all rose to their feet and addressed Death with sublime simplicity, masking nothing, evading noth- ing, but facing the huge fact with serene dignity. The gesture of standing to meet Death was nobly impressive. “Term of all that liveth, whose name is inscrutable, be favourable unto us in thine hour.”