THREE SCHOOLS OF MAGICK (1) 
69 
no need to take our ideas at second-hand. The Yellow School 
of Magick possesses one perfect classic, The Tao Teh King. 4 
It is impossible to find any religion which adequately 
represents the thought of this masterpiece. Not only is 
religion as such repugnant to science and philosophy, but 
from the very nature of the tenets of the Yellow School, its 
adherents 
are not going to put themselves to any 
inconvenience for the enlightenment of a lot of people whom 
they consider to be hopeless fools. 
At the same time, the theory of religion, as such, being a 
tissue of falsehood, the only real strength of any religion is 
derived from its pilferings of Magical doctrine; and, religious 
persons being by definition entirely unscrupulous, it follows 
that any given religion is likely to contain scraps of Magical 
doctrine, filched more or less haphazard from one school or 
the other as occasion serves. 
Let the reader, therefore, beware most seriously of trying 
to get a grasp of this subject by means of siren analogies. 
Taoism has as little to do with The Tao Teh King as the 
Catholic Church with the Gospel. 
The Tao Teh King inculcates conscious inaction, or rather 
unconscious inaction, with the object of minimizing the 
disorder of the world. A few quotations from the text should 
make the essence of the doctrine clear. 
X: 3: 
Here is the Mystery 0/ Virtue. It createth all and 
nourisheth all; yet it doth not adhere to them; it 
operateth all, but knoweth not o/it, nor proc/aimeth it; 
it directeth all, but without conscious control. 
4. Unfortunately there is no translation at present published which is the work of 
an Initiate . All existing translations have been garbled by people who simply 
failed to understand the text. An approximately perfect rendering is indeed 
available, but so far it exists only in manuscript . One object of this letter is to 
create sufficient public interest to make this work, and others of equal value, 
available to the public.