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Correspondence from Aleister Crowley to George MacNie Cowie
6 Sept 13.
Care Frater.
Just back [from Russia] having done a great deal of work for once. You have got quite the wrong conception about that ritual. If you go on with Ceremonial, the right feeling will come to you. It is almost impossible for me to explain to or describe. You might do it a million times and get nothing out of it, and then suddenly boil over. However the doing of it does produce a result in subconsciousness which will one day flower, and that perhaps not when you are doing the Ritual, but something quite different.
Another thing is this: I think you will find it better only to resort to the Ritual when you feel a sudden inspiration to do so. That is my idea of combining Magick and Meditation. You go on with Meditation until you literally cannot stick it any more, and then you will say "Well, by heaven, I'll do that Ritual", and it works. Similarly you exalt yourself tremendously by a ritual and all of a sudden sit down in the middle of the circle and shut everything out. You catch the swing of the pendulum from motion to rest. The brain stops working, and there you are.
Your reply to Tahuti is, of course, silence.
You are quite wrong about your illumination again. It ought to have been as good as you could have made it, because it was only to be used once and then destroyed.
Overwhelmed with No. X [Equinox Vol I No. 10] so no more.
The Ragged Rag Time Girls[1] will be in Edinburgh in 3 weeks. Mind you look up Mother [Leila Waddell] that Monday night.
Yours fraternally.
1—[Refers to a violin troupe of seven female players including Leila Waddell. Crowley took them through a short tour of Russia and described them as one raving nymphomaniac, three dipsomaniac-nymphomaniacs and two hysterical prudes from the East-End of London.]
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