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Page 1 of 51954 · PDF PAGE 164
…nam pueri integri Puellaeque canamus. Catullus The word of Sin is Restriction. 0 man! refuse not thy wife, if she will; 0 lover, if thou wilt, depart! There is no bond that can unite the divided but love; all else is a curse. Accurse'd! Accurse'd be it to the aeons! Consent or refusal are to be determined by the impulse itself, without reference to any other motives such as commonly influence action. So with thy all; thou hast no right but to do thy Will. Every thought, word, or act without exception is subject to this law. "Do what thou wilt" …
1954 · PDF PAGE 51
…know whether you can manage this. Cara Soror, Love is the law, love under will. Fraternally, 666 Letter G September 4, 1943 Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. "Shall be" (instead of Do what thou wilt is . .. ) not "is." See Liber AL, I: 36,54, and II: 54. Not "Master Perdurabo" : see Magick, p. XXIX. "Care Frater" is enough. 777 is practically unpurchasable: copies fetch £10 or so. Nearly all important correspondences are in Magick Table I. The other two books are being sent at once. "Working out games with numbers." I am sorry yo…
1954 · PDF PAGE 242
29 What Is Certainty? Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. The Chinese cannot help thinking that the Octave has five notes. The more necessary anything appears to my mind, the more certain it is that I only assert a limitation . I slept with Faith, and found a corpse in my arms on awaking. I drank and danced all night with Doubt , and found her a virgin in the morning. (The Book of Lies) I wouldn't start to argue with the Chinese, if I were you; they might remind you that you exude the stench peculiar to corpses. Again, …
1954 · PDF PAGE 411
62 The Elastic Mind Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. You ask me what I mean by an "elastic mind" - from our telephone conversation on Friday. It is hard to define; but let me give you an example of the bad kind: an old riddle. "Why is a story like a ghost?" Because A story's a tale a tail's a brush a brush is a broom a brougham is a carriage a carriage is a gig a gig's a trap a trap is a snare a snare's a gin gin is a spirit and a spirit's a ghost. You will have noticed a logical blunder-usually non distributio medii…
1954 · PDF PAGE 353
Cara Soror, 51 How to Recognize Masters, Angels, and How They Work Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. I have been thinking over what I wrote in my last letter with regard to the verification of appearances in the Astral Plane. I did not mention a parallel question of even greater immediate practical importance: that of one's relations with Astral or discarnate intelligences or with Those whom we call "The Masters" or "The Gods": the messages or gestures which reach us through the normal physical channels. The importance is that th…
1954 · PDF PAGE 134
11 Woolly Pomposities of the Pious "Teacher" Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. I do not think that it was any new kind of electricity. I think it was the passage itself that has given me neuralgia. It disgusts me beyond words. To put the matter in a nutshell, tersely, concisely, succinctly, the world is being corrupted by all this- Asthmatic Thinking Torpid Thinking Nauseous Thinking Bovine T. Uncertain T. Old-maidish T. Chaw bacon T. Venomous T. Purgative T. Diffuse T. Whelp T. Querulous T. Excretory T. Yahoo T. Rat-…
1954 · PDF PAGE 158
14 Noise Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. You ask me what is, at the present time, the greatest obstacle to human progress. I answer in one word: NOISE. You will recall that in Yoga the concise compendium of Initiated Instruction is: Sit still Stop thinking Shut up, and Get out. The second of these postulates the third; for one can neither think nor stop thinking with all that row going on. Then again, the Fourth Power of the Sphinx is Silence; on this subject I must refer you to Little Essays Toward Truth (No. 14, p…
1954 · PDF PAGE 280
…e! But of all plagues wherewith a man is cursed, Take my word for it, woman is the worst! (The World's Tragedy) Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. The eternal antagonism between the sexes is mere illusion. As well suppose the male the enemy of the female screw. Understand the spiritual reality of each, grasp their magical formulae; the sublime necessity of the apparent opposition will be apparent. The ultimate of Woman is Nuit; that of Man, Hadit. The Book of the Law speaks very fully and clearly in both cases. I quote…
1954 · PDF PAGE 325
46 Selfishness Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. Selfishness? I am glad to find you worrying that bone, for it has plenty of meat on it ; fine juicy meat, none of your Chilled Argentine or Canterbury lamb. It is a pelvis, what's more; for in a way the whole structure of the ethics of Thelema is founded upon it. There is some danger here; for the question is a booby trap for the noble , the generous, the high-minded . 'Selflessness', the great characteristic of the Master of the Temple, the very quintessence of his att…
1954 · PDF PAGE 520
80 Life A Gamble Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. In one or two-no, I think more like three or four-letters of yours to hand in the last couple of months , you have put forward various excuses for slackness, the necessities of your economic situation . You say you must have "regular work," and a "steady income ," and all that sort of thing. My innocent child, that species of Magick is quite simple. Take the horns of a hare ... That's enough for the present: I'll tell you what to do with them when you've got them. In …
1954 · PDF PAGE 298
40 Coincidence Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. When I was writing that letter about prophecy, I was hot and bothered all the time by my faithful sentinel, the well-greaved Hoplite that stands at the postern of my consciousness, ready to challenge every thought-and woe to the intruder who cannot give the countersign! This time the dear old ruffian thought the matter serious enough to report Higher Up. "It is put plainly enough, emphatically enough, incontrovertibly enough" was the gist of his communication "that the …
1954 · PDF PAGE 463
72 Education Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. Education means "leading out" ; this is not the same as "stuffing in." I refuse to enlarge on this theme ; it is all-important. To extract something, you should first know what is there. Here astrology ought to give useful hints ; its indications give the mind something to work on. Experience makes "confirmation strong as Holy Writ" ; but beware of a priori. Do not be dogmatic; do not insist in the face of disappointment. Astrology in education is useful as geology is to …
1954 · PDF PAGE 211
24 Necromancy and Spiritism Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. Really, you make me ashamed of you! To write to ignorant me to wise you up about necromancy, when you have at your elbow the one supreme classic-Levi's Chapter XIII in the Dogme et Rituel! 1 What sublimity of approach! What ingenuity of "considerations"! With what fatally sure steps marches his preparation! With what superb technique does he carry out his energized enthusiasm! And, finally, with what exact judicial righteousness does he sum the results of h…
1954 · PDF PAGE 335
48 Morals of Liber AL Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. No man alive can appreciate better than myself the difficulties connected with The Book of the Law. You ask me, if I have rightly analysed your somewhat complicated series of questions, to advise you as to your attitude towards that Book. To begin: the Author is quite certainly both more than human , and other than human. His main aim seems to me to announce the Magical Formula of the Aeon of Horus, and to lay down the fundamental principles of conduct that are c…
1954 · PDF PAGE 373
53 "Mother Love" Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. You enthusiastically remark that the love of the mother for the off-spring is something that no man can understand: and you appear to prize it! Well, some men have had a jolly good shot at it, notably Emile Zola. The Usher goes into the corridor, and calls that name in strident and stentorian tones. In he waddles, the squat, obese, bespectacled, studious Jew, with the most devastating of all his thunderbolts under his arm-La Terre, and so what? La Terre to him is inde…
1954 · PDF PAGE 430
66 Vampires Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. So you want me to tell you all about Vampires? Vampire yourself! I ask you, how does this come within the scope of your enquiries? Is this information essential to your Accomplishment of the Great Work? As the Government might say "Is your journey really necessary?" So musing, I rang you up for details. Vampires, you say, might be a temptation to yourself, or they might sap your energy. Very good. I will tell you the little I know. Listen to Eliphas Levi! He warns us again…
1954 · PDF PAGE 60
1 What Is Magick? Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. What is Magick? Why should anyone study and practice it? Very natural; the obvious preliminary questions of any subject soever. We must certainly get all this crystal clear; fear not that I shall fail to set forth the whole business as concisely as possible yet as fully, as cogently yet as lucidly, as may prove within my power to do. At least I need not waste any time on telling you what Magick is not; or to go into the story of how the word came to be misapplied to …
1954 · PDF PAGE 81
4 The Qabalah The Best Training for Memory Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. Now you must learn Qabalah. Learn this Alphabet of Magick. You must take it on trust, as a child does his own alphabet. No one has ever found out why the order of the letters is what it is. Probably there isn't any answer. But our Magical Alphabet is primarily not letters, but figures, not sounds but mathematical ideas. Sir Humphrey Davy, coming out of his famous illumination (with some help from Nitrous Oxide he got in) exclaimed : The Unive…
1954 · PDF PAGE 275
37 Death-Fear-Magickal Memory Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. You ask me, very naturally, for details of the promise of Nuit (AL, I: 58) "certainty, not faith, while in life, upon death." In the first place, I think that it means what it says. There may be, probably is, some Qabalistic inner meaning: Those four nouns most assuredly look as if there were; but I don't feel at all sure what the Greek (or Hebrew, or Arabic) words would be; in any case, I have not yet made any attempt in this direction. To the straightfo…
1954 · PDF PAGE 130
10 The Scolex School Cara Soror, Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. You actually want to know how to distinguish gold from copper pyrites- "fool's gold" they called it in '49 California-no! I wasn't there-or "absolute" alcohol and-Liqueur Whisky from "alki" (commercial alcohol-see Jack London's The Princess, a magnificent story-don't miss it!) and Wartime Scotch as sold in most British pubs in 1944, era vulgari. One pretty good plan is to take a masterpiece, pick out a page at random, translate it into French or German or whatever…