Magick Without Tears

290 MAGICK WITHOUT TEARS continued indefmitely. X had one rule of life, and one only; to do whatever came first on the list of agenda, and never to count the cost. Because this course of conduct was so rigidly rational, it appeared to others irrational and incalculable; because it was so serenely simple, it appeared an insoluble mystery of a complexity utterly unfathomable! But-I fear that you are only too likely to ask-is not this system (a) absurd, (b) wrong, as certain in the long run to defeat its own object? Well, as to (a), everything is absurd. The Universe is not constructed to gratify the mania of "social planners" and their tedious kind. As to (b), there you said something; the refutation will lead us to open a new chapter. Ought not X to have laid down a comprehensive scheme, and worked out the details, so that he would not break down half-way through for lack of foresight and provision for emergencies? An example. Suppose that the next step in his Work involved the sacrifice of a camel in a house in Tooting Bec, furnished in such fashion as his Grimoire laid down, and that the purchase of the house left him without resources to buy that furniture, to say nothing of the camel. What a fool! No, that does not necessarily follow. If the Gods will the End, They also will the means. I shall do all that is possible to me by buying the house; I shall leave it to Them to do Their share when the time comes. This "Act of Truth" is already a Magical Formula of infallible puissance; the man who is capable of so thinking and acting is far more likely to get what he wanted from the Sacrifice-when at long last the Camel appears on the premises-than he who, having ample means to carry out the whole Operation without risk of failure, goes through the ceremony without ever having experienced a moment's anxiety about his ability to bring it to a successful conclusion. I think personally that the error lies in calculating. The injunction is "to buy the egg of a perfectly black hen without