Magick Without Tears

"SELF" INTROVERSION 277 Zeus, or Apollo, or Dionysus, which does demand identification of oneself with the object of one's worship, to a form of self-worship which soon develops into a maniacal exacerbation of the Ego; and if one persists in this involuted curve, one becomes a "Black Brother," or departs for the local loony-bin . Invocations of even the most positive Gods are dangerous, unless care can be taken to keep the personality of the God distinct from one's own. Athene is a superb deity ; but one does not want to be nothing but Athene, except in that supreme moment of Samadhi with Her which is the climax of the invocation. So, even in divine invocation, one should insist on definite communication of knowledge (or what not) which is incontestably not one's own. The fact that the self-begotten feelings and ideas are so eminently satisfactory-naturally, since there is nobody to oppose them-is damnably seductive. Once started on that road, one can easily develop self-deception to a fine art. One can imagine that one has undergone, or achieved, all sorts of experiences "as described in the books," when all that one has actually done is to work the results of one's reading into a bubble inflated by imagination. It should be obvious to you that the habit grows on one; every bad quality, from vanity to laziness, lends most willing aid. One replaces reality more and more continuously by these exciting and flattering reveries, which by this time have no longer any shadow of a claim to be called mystic experiences at all. Now do remember this: it is the guarantee of wholesomeness in any Invocation that there should be contact with another. It is better to conjure up the most obnoxious demons from the most noisome pit of Hell than to take one's own excitations for Divine benediction; if only because there was never a demon yet so atrocious as that same old Ego. You will discover the truth of these remarks when you