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Page 1 of 51954 · PDF PAGE 267
…lem. It had been translated "Reason," "The Way," "TO ON." None of these convey any true conception of the Tao. The Tao is Reason in this sense, that the substance of things may be in part apprehended as being that necessary relation between the elements of thought which determines the laws of reason. In other words, the only reality is that which compels us to connect the various forms of illusion as we do. It is thus evidently unknowable, and expressible neither by speech nor by silence. All that we can know about it is that there is inherent …
1954 · PDF PAGE 388
…POLITICS 355 Practically all those parts of the Book which deal with social matters may be considered as political in the old and proper sense of the word; of modern politics it disdains to speak. Love is the law, love under will. Fraternally yours, 666
1954 · PDF PAGE 219
186 MAGICK WITHOUT TEARS never yields to reason. It destroys aU sense of values. Its origin is usually obscure. The least irrational base of it is the sense ofsmell. It was, ifI remember rightly, the Comte de St. Germain who advised Louise de la Valliere to fix her exquisitely broidered kerchief in such wise that it protected her from contact with her saddle, and then , after a morning's hard gallop, to find an excuse for using it to wipe the brows of the perspiring king. It took him years to recover! The story is well known, and the plan widel…
1954 · PDF PAGE 205
…new vision of life is not a dream, but part and parcel of Experience for evermore, as real as any other manifestation of Reality through sense such as is common to all men. And this brings us-it has been a long way round-from the suggestion of your visit to the question (hitherto unanswered) in your letter. You raise so vast and razor-edged a question when you write of the supposed antinomy of "soul" and "sense" that it seemed better to withhold comment until this later letter; much meditation was most needful to compress the answer within reas…
1954 · PDF PAGE 234
…the desires of a gorilla, a crocodile, a rat, a devil-fish, or what have you! One is no longer capable of human thoughts in the ordinary sense of the word; such would be wholly unintelligible. I leave the rest to your imagination; doesn't it sound to you a little like some of the accounts of "The Dweller on the Threshold?" Love is the law, love under will. Fraternally, 666
1954 · PDF PAGE 251
…ts a phrase, one starts to kick holes in it! Yet we both know perfectly well all the time what we do mean. But this is certainly not the sense of the word in your question. It may clear our minds, as has so often happened, if we examine it through the lens of dear old Skeat. Religion, he says, Latin: religio, piety. Collecting or paying attention to: religens as opposed to negligens, neglecting; the attitude of Gallio. But it also implies a binding together, i.e., of ideas; in fact, a "body of doctrine." Not a bad expression. A religion then, i…
1954 · PDF PAGE 113
…may be the greater. The formula is evidently one of dauntless courage. It expresses the idea of vitality and manhood in its most dynamic sense. The only religion which corresponds to this School at all is that of ancient Egypt; possibly also that of Chaldea. This is because those religions are Magical religions in the strict technical sense; the religious component of them is negligible. So far as it exists, it exists only for the uninitiate. There are, however, traces of the beginning of the influence of the School in Judaism and in Paganism. …
1954 · PDF PAGE 311
…ell, now, if that isn't too funny! The text of this stupendous sermon was AL. II: 22. I take this verse in its most obvious and ordinary sense; for instance , the following sentence: "The exposure of innocence is a lie" ; for that means clearly enough Hypocrisy. So "It is a lie, this folly against self" only means "To hell with sentimental altruism , with false modesty , with all those most insidious fiends, the sense of guilt, of shame-in a word, the 'inferiority complex' or something very like it." The whole tenor of The Book of the Law is to…
1954 · PDF PAGE 519
486 MAGICK WITHOUT TEARS "sunning over with little curls" is that Progress demands Anarchy tempered by Common Sense, and that the most formida ble 0 bstacle is this Biology. The experience of the Magician and the Yogi does suggest that there is room in the human brain as at present constituted for almost limitless expansion. At least our system of Training is more immediately practical than digging up our Corpora Quadragemina and planting them in a Monkey's Medulla just to see what will come of it. So put down that bread-knife! Love is the law,…
1954 · PDF PAGE 465
…h: the Book of Wisdom or Folly. The book is itself Education; there are, however, six chapters which treat of the subject in the special sense in which your question has involved us. So I shall fling these chapters headlong into this letter. De Voluntate Juvenum Long, 0 my Son, hath been this Digression from the plain Path of my Word concerning Children; but it was most needful that thou shouldst understand the Limits of true Liberty. For that is not the Will of any Man which ultimateth in his own Ruin and that of all his Fellows; and that is n…
1954 · PDF PAGE 451
418 MAGICK WITHOUT TEARS contempt the theory of "original sin" in the sense which you probably meant me to take: the defect deliberately implanted in man by "Old Nobodaddy" with no better object than to prepare the grotesquely tragic farce of the "Atonement." I will merely remark that no idea at once so base and so contemptible, so bestial and so idiotic, can challenge its ignoble absurdity. Rotten with sex-perversion, it is a noisome blend of sadism and masochism based on the most abject form of fear. The only argument for it is that it ever d…
1954 · PDF PAGE 71
38 MAGICK WITHOUT TEARS But there is a restricted and conventional sense in which the word may be used without straying too far from the above philosophical position . One might say: "Magick is the study and use of those forms of energy which are (a) subtler than the ordinary physical-mechanical types, (b) accessible only to those who are (in one sense or another) 'Initiates'." I fear that this may sound rather obscurum per obscurius; but this is one of those cases-we are likely to encounter many such in the course of our researches-in which we…
1954 · PDF PAGE 318
…ying into a Black Lodge, and finding himself at home there. Against this risk we look to our insurance; there are two infallible: Common Sense and the Sense of Humour. To this rule there is, as usual with rules, an exception. Some states of mind are of the same structure as poetry, where the "one step from the sublime to the ridiculous" is an easy and fatal step. But even so, pedantry is as bad as ribaldry. Personally , I have tried to avoid the dilemma by the use of poetic language and form ; for instance, in AHA! It is all difficult , damned …
1954 · PDF PAGE 466
EDUCATION 433 every Statement is in some Sense disputable. Therefore in every Case, even the simplest, the Child should be taught not only the Thesis, but also its opposite , leaving the Decision to the child's own Judgment and good Sense, fortified by Experience. And this Practice will develop its Power of Thought, and its Confidence in itself, and its Interest in all Knowledge. But most of all beware against any Attempt to bias its Mind on any Point that lieth without the Square of ascertained and undisputed Fact. Remember also, even when tho…
1954 · PDF PAGE 314
THE HOLY GUARDIAN ANGEL 281 of will in any intelligible sense of the word. Their actions in fact are merely re-actions. They are, of course, entirely lacking in the Supernal Triad. There is therefore no question of anything in them which would persist through change. Perhaps it would be better to say that change does not really affect them. Another way to put it would be that they are adjectives, not nouns. They are merely sensible manifestations of the elements to which they are attributed , and to the letters of their name. Now, on the othe: …
1954 · PDF PAGE 461
…th is one of the bogeys; but far deeper is the root-fear-fear of being alone, of being oneself, of life itself. With this there goes the sense of guilt. The Book of the Law cuts directly at the root of all this calamitous, this infamous tissue of falsehood. What is the meaning of Initiation? It is the Path to the realization of your Self as the sole, the supreme, the absolute of all Truth, Beauty , Purity, Perfection! What is the artistic sense in you? What but the One Channel always open to you through which this Light flows freely to enkindle…
1954 · PDF PAGE 534
…periment as we know them, are altogether in their way dependent on the existence of our own peculiar natures. If, for example, we had no sense to use in our exploration but that of hearing, we should have worked out a classification of trees entirely different from that which we now possess. We should have taught our students how to distinguish the sounds made by an oak and an elm respectively in a storm; the differences in the rustling of various kinds of grass, and so on. Similarly the results of our magical experiments are naturally and nece…
1954 · PDF PAGE 98
…e always been, at least in nucleus, three main Schools of Philosophical practice. (We use the word 'philosophical' in the old good broad sense, as in the phrase "Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society for the Advancement of Knowledge.") It is customary to describe these three Schools as Yellow, Black and White. The first thing necessary is to warn the reader that they must by no means be confounded with racial distinctions of colour; and they correspond still less with conventional symbols such as yellow caps, yellow robes, black magic…
1954 · PDF PAGE 208
…arnessing the winged horses of the Sun to the ploughshare of Reason, in showing the validity of this doctrine in detail. It satisfies my sense of rhythm and of symmetry to explain that every experience, no matter what, must of necessity be a gain of grandeur, of grip, of comprehension and enjoyment ever growing as complexity and simplicity succeed each other in sublime systole and diastole, in strophe and antistrophe chanting against each other to the stars of the Night and of the Morning! Of course it is easy as pie to knock all this to pieces…
1954 · PDF PAGE 89
… theory of the Universe. Everything fits perfectly. Also, when I say "realization," I want you to understand that I mean what I say in a sense so intense and so absolute that it is impossible to convey my meaning to anyone who has not undergone that experience. 3 How do we judge the "reality" of an ordinary impression upon consciousness? Chiefly by its intensity, by its persistence, by the fact that nobody can argue us out of our belief in it. As people said of Berkeley's 'Idealism' - "his arguments are irrefutable but they fail to carry convic…