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Page 65 of 921919 · PDF PAGE 141
…ssential before really setting out. If you add any exer- cise of your own then do it at a definite hour daily and do it continuously; to take up an exercise and then drop it is worse than useless, for it is unbalancing.” Now, as any Probationer knows, as soon as one sets out to do the simplest task regularly and with magical intent, that task becomes not only difficult, but well nigh impossible of performance. This is just what V.I.O. found, and no sooner had his task been set than all kinds of difficulties presented themselves, like the dog-fa…
1922 · PDF PAGE 183
…s to my eyes. I shook out a dose of the dull white He sniffed it up with stupid lethargy like a man who has lost hope of life, yet still takes his medicine as a routine. He came up gradually, but was hardly himself till after the third dose. I took one, too, to keep him company, not because I needed it. I sent bim out to get shaved and buy clean linen. I take a curious delight in writing this diary. I know now why it is and it has rather startled me. It’s just that chance phrase of King Lamus: “ Your magical diary.” I have flirted a lot with La…
1929 · PDF PAGE 20
…es. (Illustration: A banker may hâve a perfect grasp of a given situation, yet lack the quality of decision, or the assets, necessary to take advantage of it.) (6) “Every man and every woman is a star’. That is to say, every human being is intrinsically an independent individual with his own proper character and proper motion. ( 7 ) Every man and every woman has a course, depending partly on the self, and partly on the environment which is natural and necessary for each. Anyone who is forced from his own course, either through not understanding…
1922 · PDF PAGE 131
…orning, and then we were to go to a certain drinking place, the Fauno Ebbrio, and as soon as the coast was clear he would pick us up and take us along to the Gatto Fritto, and we would know for the first time what life was really like. ‘Well, I call that a perfectly straight, decent, sensible programme. It’s the duty of every Englishman to learn as much of foreign affairs as he can without inter- fering with his business. That sort of knowledge will always come in useful in case of another European War. It was knowing that sort of thing that ha…
1929 · PDF PAGE 177
… moods, Lisa la Giuffria would have started for China at the least provocation, provided that she could start within the hour. She could take a lover, or throw one away, a dozen times in a year, and would have been indignant and amazed if any one had called her fickle. She was not insincere; but she believed with her whole soul [250] that her immediate impulse was the true Will of her whole Self. One night at the Savoy Hotel with Lavinia King, just before Christmas, the talk had turned on the distress then prevailing in London. Instantly she ha…
1929 · PDF PAGE 115
…; the trick is to prevent people noticing you when they would normally do so. In this I was quite successful. For example, I was able to take a walk in the street in a golden crown and a scarlet robe without attracting attention. Most interesting of all, perhaps, is a magical practice which I devised, ostensibly to deal with the dilemma propounded by the Sphinx: "The postulant to Magic must be morally perfect." It may be that I felt instinctively that my pious predecessors were wrong in demanding the suppression of manhood and imposing arbitrar…
1922 · PDF PAGE 133
…od to my head. I only wanted a legitimate excuse for killing a few hundred people. But nature is wise and kind, and I was always able to take it out of Lou. The passions of murder and love are inseparably connected in our ancestry. All civilisation has done is to teach us to pretend to idealise them. The programme went off without the slightest hitch. Our room opened on to a terrace in deep shadow. At this time of year there was hardly any one in the hotel, of course. A little flight of steps at the side of the terrace took us under an arch of …
1922 · PDF PAGE 221
…ce and called me his favourite nightin- gale. ‘Thou wast not born for death, immortal bird,’ he chuckled, ‘but neither wast thou born to take a course of Neo-Platonism.’ His whole point is that one mustn’t leave the rails. If I had convinced myself
1922 · PDF PAGE 354
…didn’t become that without some power of dealing with men, told you that you were not a great flyer. How was it exactly that you came to take up flying?” That simple question induced a very surprising reaction. There was no reason why it should produce ’ the intense irritation that it did.- _ Basil noticed it, rubbed his hands together gleefully, and began to hum “ Tipperary.”’” His meaning was evident. He had drawn a bow in a venture; and it had pierced the King of Israel between the joints of his harness. He got up with alacrity, and went off…
1954 · PDF PAGE 19
…ughout the years. His mother, in moments of exasperation no doubt, would call him a "beast." With his knowledge of the Bible, it did not take him long to find out about the Beast of the Book of Revelation, the Beast who was anti-Christ, the Beast whose number was 666. He ultimately identified himself with that Beast, without question aided and abetted by his mother. When the time came to revolt and to turn against the religion of his family, with all the venom and brilliance that he, and only he, could muster, there could be no alternative but …
1954 · PDF PAGE 420
…s high treason to existence. Its results are immediately harmful; it begets depression, melancholy, despair. In fact, one does wisely to take the bear by the ring in his snout; accept his conclusions, agree that it is all abject and futile and silly-and turn the hose-pipe of the Trance of Laughter on him until he dances to your pleasure. But-is this any answer to your problem? It disturbs me a little that you should try to palm off "Peace" upon my sentries as the password. Too often peace is merely the result of war-weariness, and the very nega…
1922 · PDF PAGE 67
…ue friend, but a wise friend. She had evidently foreseen that we were going to run short of good old snow. Now I want all you fellows to take it as read that a man, if he calls himself a man, isn’t the kind of man that wants to stop a honeymoon with a girl in a Japanese kimono of the variety described, to have to put on a lot of beastly clothes and hunt all around Paris for a dope peddler. Of course, you'll say at once that I could have rung for the waiter and have him bring me a few cubic kilometres. But that’s simply because you don’t under- …
1922 · PDF PAGE 132
…ry and unreal from their point of view as the square root of minus one. _ We didn’t ask humanity to judge us. It was simply a case of mistaken identity to regard us as featherless bipeds at all. We may have looked like human beings to their eyes ; in fact, they sent in bills and things as if we had been human beings. But I refuse to be responsible for the mistakes of the inferior animals. I humour them to some extent in their delusions, because they’re lunatics and ought to be humoured. But it’s a long way between that and admitting that their …
1922 · PDF PAGE 266
…a -single dose of heroin or even morphine would make one instantly the equal of the greatest minds in the world. a [~~ We had decided to take the prussic acid in our coffee. I do not think we were afraid of death ; life had become such an infinitely boring alternation between a period of stimulation which failed to stimulate and of depression which hardly even depressed. There was no object in going on. It was simply not worth while. On the other hand, there was a certain hesitation about stopping because of the effort required. We felt that ev…
1954 · PDF PAGE 267
…ing merely landmarks invented for convenience in describing our experiences. The Tao possesses no power to cause anything to exist or to take place. Yet our experience when analyzed tells us that the only reality of which we may be sure is this path or Way which resumes the whole of our knowledge.
1922 · PDF PAGE 101
…ifficulty in getting a trifle like that, but as I told Feccles, it would mean my selling out some beastly stock or something which might take two or three days. There was no time to lose; because the option would lapse if it weren’t taken up within the week, and it was now Wednesday. However, Feccles helped me to draft a wire to Wolfe to explain the urgency, and Feccles was to call on Saturday at nine o'clock with the papers. Meanwhile, of course, he wouldn’t let me down, but D.D.F. G
1922 · PDF PAGE 376
…ty of a relapse, because the cause of my downfall had been permanently removed. I could understand perfectly how it was that Basil could take a dose of heroin or cocaine, could indulge in hashish, ether, or opium as simply and usefully as the ordinary man can order a cup of strong black coffee when he happens to want to work late at night. He had become completely master of himself, because he had ceased to oppose himself to the current of spiritual will-power of which he was the vehicle. He had no fear or fascina- tion with regard to any of th…
1954 · PDF PAGE 313
280 MAGICK WITHOUT . TEARS I do not think that I have anywhere mentioned how this is done. l To take an example, let us have Qedemel-the Hebrew letters as Q.D.M.A.L., and the numeration is 175, which is that of the sum of the first 49 numbers, as is proper to Venus. We may then expect the head or headdress of the spirit to be in some way characteristic of the Sign of Pisces. The general form of the body will be indicated by the Daleth, the letter of Venus, and the lower part (or perhaps the quality) will be determined by the watery Mem-the term…
1922 · PDF PAGE 5
…! And now A pallid coward, with sly, skulking brow, You must leave Sodom for your spouse’s sake. Coward and coward and coward; who would take The best flower of my life and leave me so, Still loving you—Ah! weak—and turn to go For fear of such a God! O blind! O fool! To heed these strangers and to be the tool Of their smooth lies and monstrous miracles. O break this bondage and cast off their spells! Five righteous! Thou a righteous man! A jest! A righteous man—you always loved me best, And even when lured by lips of wanton girls Would turn awa…
1929 · PDF PAGE 41
…ent and future correspondents ready indexed: y our cabinet has a System of letters and numbers meaningless in them- selves, but ready to take on a meaning to you, as you fill up the files. As your business increased, each letter and number would receive fresh accessions of meaning for youj and by adopting this orderly arrangement you would be able to hâve a much more comprehensive grasp of your affairs than would otherwise be the case. By the use of this System the magician is able ultimately to unify the whole of his knowledge — to trans¬ mute…