FOLLOW A WORD THROUGH THE COLLECTION
Search the corpus.
Phrase search ignores case and repeated whitespace. All-words search finds whole words anywhere on the same page. OCR errors can affect results.
21 matching pages
Page 1 of 21909 · PDF PAGE 55
…ion one can very nearly always (especially with a little experience) trace the chain. With neigh- bourhood-concentration this is not 50. Perhaps there is a chain, but so great already is the power of prevent- ing the impressions from rising into consciousness that one has no knowledge of the links, each one having been automatically slaughtered on the threshold of the consciousness. Of course, the honest and wary practitioner will have no difficulty in recognising the right kind of wandering; with this explanation there is no excuse for him if h…
1909 · PDF PAGE 71
… drink, other physical impulses, weather, and so on, and comparing them with the curve of mystic enthusiasm and attainment. Though it is perhaps true that perfect health and (Bien- étre are the bases of any true trance or rapture, it seems unlikely that mere exuberance of the former can excite the latter. In other words there is probably some first matter of the work which is not anything we know of as bodily. On my return to London, I must certainly put the matter before more experienced mathematicians, and if possible, get a graphic analysis o…
1909 · PDF PAGE 20
… been meditating :in Hanged Man position. Thought dull and wandering; yet once “ the concep- tion of the Glowing Fire" seen as a planet (perhaps Mars). Just enough to destroy the concentration ; then it went out, dammit! Have attended to correspondence and other business and drunk a citron pressé. The Voice of the Nadi began to resound. Have done ”Bornless One ” in Asana. Good; yet I am filled with utter despair at the hopelessness of the Task. Especially do I get the Buddhist feeling, not only that Asana is intensely painful, but that all conce…
1909 · PDF PAGE 45
… is to be made between attainment of this grade in the natural and in the spiritual world. The former I long since possessed.) I. It may perhaps mean severe asceticism. In case I should be going out on that path I will try and get a real good dinner to fortify myself. 2. The paths leading to Geburah are from Hod, that of the Hanged Man, andfrom Tiphereth, that of Justice, both equilibrated aspects of Severity, the one implying Self—Sacrifice, the other involuntary suffering. One is Free- will, the other Karma; and that in a wider sense than tha…
1909 · PDF PAGE 25
…e devil else can Ι express it? The consciousness seemed to flow, instead of pattering. Is that clear? One should here note that there may perhaps be some essential difference in the Operation of the Moslem and Hindu mantrams. The latter boom; the former ripple. I have never tried the former at all seriously until now. 23
1909 · PDF PAGE 103
… he will go on correcting his proofs. Lunch over, and the proofs read through. He will make a few decorations further in his Ritual, and perhaps design the Frontispiece and Colophon. He is very weary, and may sleep. He has done the illumination, as far as may be. He will now lie down as Hanged Man, and invoke Adonai. 101
1909 · PDF PAGE 14
…uide one, leading to disgust for too much food and so on. Ifthere be upon my limbs any chain that requires a definite effort to break it, perhaps sleep is that chain. But we shall see—so/m'lur ambulando. If any asceti- cism be desirable later on, true wariness will soon detect any danger, and devise a means to meet it and overcome it. Have finished bath and massage, during which I continued steadily but quite gently, “not by a strain laborious and hurtful but with stability void of move- ment,” willing the Presence of Adonai. I ordered a dozen oy…
1909 · PDF PAGE 119
…? The beast feels decidedly better; but whether he is more concentrated one may doubt. Honestly, he is now so blind that he cannot tell! Perhaps a “cafe, cognac, et Cigare” may tune him up to the point of either going back to work, or across Paris to the Hammam. He will make the experiment, reading through his proofs the while. One good thing; the Chittam is moving slowly. The waiters all hurry him—what a contrast to last night l Proofs read through again. John St. John feels far from well. A stroll down the Boul’ Mich’ and avisit to M—’s studi…
1909 · PDF PAGE 95
… and waited in the proper magical manner. Also I was too pleased with the Heralds of my Lord’s coming—the vision of Khephra, etc. It was perhaps this subtle self-satisfaction that lost me . . . so I fell to the shocking abyss of last night! The Dweller of the Threshold is never visible until after one has fallen; he is a Veiled God and smites like the Evil Knight in Malory, riding and slaying—and no man seeth him. But when you are tumbled headlong into Hell, where he lives, then he unveils his Face, and blasts you with its horror! Very good, Jo…
1909 · PDF PAGE 107
…of a record like this. It makes it impossible to cheat oneself. Well, he has got to get up more steam somehow, though the boiler bursts. Perhaps early dinner, with Ritual, may induce that Enthusiastic Energy of which the Gnostics write. This morning the whole Sankhara-dhatu (the tendency of the being John St. John) was operating aright. Now by no effort of will can he flog his tired cattle along the trail. So poor a thing is he that he will even seek an Oracle from the book of Zoroaster. Done. Zoroaster respectfully wishes to point out that " Th…
1909 · PDF PAGE 44
…ge through the 6“: 5° grade—though of course that grade is really symbolic of this soul—journey, not vire versui— and through 7°=4° ; so perhaps—-if one could only dare to hope it !—to the 8°=3° attainment Certainly what little I have done so far pertains no higher than Minor adeptship, though I have used higher formula: in the course of my working. My Prana is acting in a feverish manner ; a mixture of fatigue and energy. This is not good: it probably comes from bolting that big lunch, and may mean that I must sleep to recover equilibrium. I w…
1909 · PDF PAGE 47
… with a little fog; and, one may suspect, the air is overcharged with electricity. I will rest quietly with my mantra as Hanged Man, and perhaps sleep for a little. . No sleep—no rest for the wicked! ’Tis curious how totally independent is mantra-yoga of reverie. I can say my mantra vigorously while my thought wanders all over the world; yetI cannot write the simplest sentence without stopping it, unless with a very great effort, and then it is not satisfactory to either party! Meditation—~of the " rational ” sort—on this leads me to suggesttha…
1909 · PDF PAGE 51
…at will happen, one can force oneself to the act. This, then, is a possible form of self-martyrdom. Similarly, mutilations; though it is perhaps just to observe that all these people are mad when they do these things, and their standard 01 pleasure and pain consequently so different from the sane man’s as to be incomprehensible. Look at my Uncle Toml who goes about the world bragging of his chastity. The maniac is probably happy—a peacock who is all tail! And squawk. Look at the Vegetarians and Wallaceites and all that crew of lunatics. They ar…
1909 · PDF PAGE 64
…rcle, just as I got to West, I would swing right back to West—Nor’-West: turn easily enough, in short, to any point but due West, within perhaps 5", but never pass that point. I have taught myself to do it, but always with an effort. Is this a common experience ? I connect it with my faculty of knowing direction, which all mountaineers and travellers who have been with me admit to be quite exceptional. If I leave my tent or hut by a door facing, say, South- West, throughout that whole day, over all kinds of ground, through any imaginable jungle…
1909 · PDF PAGE 94
…beginneth to dawn upon the Path, so that I see a little better where I stand. This whole journey seems under some other formula than IAO—perhaps a Pentagram formula with which I am not clearly acquainted. If I knew the Word of the Grade, I could foretell things: but I don’t. I think I will read through the whole Record to date and see 11 I can find an Ariadne-clue. Back, and settled to Ritual—painting. Finished: bar frontispiece and colophon, which I can design and execute to—morrow. Took half an hour off, making a silly sketch of a sunset. Will…
1909 · PDF PAGE 33
…Work itself may become an obsession. I 1 hours with no real break—not bad. The bad part of to-day seems the Asana, and the deadness. Or, perhaps worse, I fail to apprehend the true magical purport of my work: hence all sort of aimless formulae, leading—naturallyenough—to no result. It just strikes me—it may be this Isis Apophis Osiris IAO formula that I have preached so often. Certainly the first two days were Isis—natural, pleasant, easy events. Most certainly too to-day has been Apophis! Think of the wild cursing and black magic, etc. . . . we…
1909 · PDF PAGE 27
…ngth, and Gladness; as is appropriate to these symbols. But I find it very difficult to keep the mantra going, even in tune with the jaws; perhaps it is that this peculiar method of eating (25 minutes 25
1909 · PDF PAGE 92
…ss a million pounds. The “answer" is not an answer; it is a begging of the question. What a fool I am! and people think me clever. Ergo, perhaps!
1909 · PDF PAGE 32
…eeding game is certainly marvellous. I should like to work marching and breathing with this mantra as I did of old with Aum Tat Sat Aum. Perhaps two steps to a mantra, and 4—8—16 steps to a breath— cycle? This would mean 28 seconds for a breath— cycle; quite enough for a marching man. We might try 4—8—8 to start; or even 8—8—8 (for the Chariot, wherein the Geburah of me rises to Binah—Strength winningthe Wings ofUndertanding). [These symbols, allusions, and references will all be found in 777, just published by “ The Equinox "—see advt.—ED.]
1909 · PDF PAGE 57
…easier to get on to than is the usual Hindu type with its 1% and n sounds predominating: but it does not shake the brain up so forcibly. Perhaps ’tis none the worse {or that. I think the unconscious training of the brain to an even rhythm better than startlingit into the same bya series of shocks. I should like, too, to remark that the suggestions in the “Herb Dangerous " [We hope to publish this essay in No. 2 of “The Equinox ”—EDr] for a ritual seem the wrong way round. It seems to me that the Eastern methods are very arid, and chiefly valuabl…