Magick Without Tears

FASCINATIONS 185 (Personally, I have always used, or heard, it much less seriously: "attractive" hardly more.) Skeat, surprisingly, is almost dumb: p. part. of "to enchant" and "from L. fascinum, a spell. " Yes, surprisingly; for the word is one of the many that mean the Phallus. The implication is that there is some sexual element in the exciting and alluring quality, which lifts it altogether above mere "pleasing." To my mind the implication is that there is some quality inherent which is cognate to that too totally irrational quasimagnetic force which has been responsible not only for innumerable personal tragedies-and comedies-but for the fall of dynasties and even the wreck of Empires. "Christ" is reported as having said: "If I be lifted up from the earth, I will draw all men unto me." Interpret this in the light of the Cross as a Phallic emblem, and-how lurid a flash! Compare AL, II: 26: "I am the secret Serpent coiled about to spring; in my coiling there is joy. If I /ift up my head, I and my Nuit are one. If I droop down my head, and shoot forth venom, then is rapture of the earth, and I and the earth are one. " This versicle is deep, devilish deep; and it is chock-a-block with the mysteries of Fascination. Dig into this, dear sister! dig with your Qabalistic trowel; don't blame me if you don't get a Mandrake with the very first thrust! But most certainly I shall say nothing here. Yes, indeed, nothing was ever more sternly forbidden than prattle on subjects like this! Look! It goes right on: "There is great danger in me; for who doth not understand these runes shall make a great miss. He shall fall down into the pit called Because, and there he shall perish with the dogs of Reason." (v 27) The pit is of course the Abyss: see The Vision and the Voice, 10th Aethyr. A very sticky-or rather, unstuck! finish; so 'ware Hawk! To business! Fascination. No! Invisibility, is obviously penny. plain S.A. This is notably an affair of the subconscious; it often masters open dislike and distaste; it