|
Correspondence from Aleister Crowley to Charles Stansfeld Jones
An XII
[6 September 1916]
Son,
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
I've always thought O.H.O. (this is Treason!) lacked genius. He's a German: abundant knowledge' marvellous talent; but just not the One They Needed. You've got it; I saw that in V'[an]couver; and I was far from expecting it, to be frank with you. But I knew it in the first minute I spoke with you.
Now do work this thing. Possibly you and I are the only people in two and one and an half thousand years who have Just That. You did not have so horrible a boyhood as I; so you haven't had to [illegible] yourself so hard. Here it pleases you to make the highest square with the [illegible]. It's there, lad! It's deep—and deadly. Root the damned thing up!
It's all theoretically unproved; but one does gain a freedom from certain practices which one can't get from the mere proof that [illegible]. There's actual magical contact. When you've been had by three [illegible] and a Church you're a different man; and you can't get it by arguing about it. Your method squares with magical theory; but in practice it's masturbation. I don't mind telling you, because you're not [illegible] the hypnotized. Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie. You're all right on Dogme. But you must do things to internalize your magical force, just as the cleverest doctor must actually take the quinine to dose his malaria.
I think that sexual knowledge should be based broadly on intercourse with say 1000 women chosen from 80 to 100 races and sub-races. Other branches of the study are easily mastered, except saphism, which is hard even to witness, as you have to be on very intimate terms with one of the girls, and if both are real exclusive Sapphists, you can't be, unless you can work your Point of View as an artist, or a statement of sex.
Now with this [illegible] basis you still know nothing much, but you have enough to know how absolutely [illegible] is the person who has had about 3. Also, you can guard head and heart fairly well, and won't make a fool of yourself over 'the [illegible] of a patch of numeous membrane', which is important for a person in a big position in an Order. The better known you get, the more women try to fool you; and it's useful to be able to tell at a glance what a woman's sexual secret is. They know you know, and become your slaves. You should show your absolute mastery of sex, treat the whole thing as unimportant, a mere toy compared to what you know, and unless the women realize that you know more about it than they do, if they suspect that your contempt of it comes from ignorance of it, they will despise you utterly. You must of course be up in the technique; I had an awful blow last November when a girl asked me "Have you ever been pricked with needles in the dark?" and I had not. The brand of that shame scars my forehead to this hour.
You should get Dr. J. G. Frazer’s Golden Bough from the Library and read steadily through it—11 volumes, it will give you a sound basis of knowledge of all kinds of rites and faiths, and you must get lists for re-establishing old customs. You might people generally interested, persuade the whole city to turn out to celebrate St. John’s Eve, or St, George’s day, in the old ways. Point out to the civic authorities that they can attract visitors from all the world over as Nice does with its Carnival, and Seville with its Holy Week. There’s money in it; it only needs brains to get it out. Try an exoteric Folk-lore society, with readings and papers, always with the idea of reviving the old rites. Ordinary idle people like this, because it’s ‘picturesque’ and all that rot.
I certainly wish you’d been able to keep out of going back to work; but I think that a successful fall and winter campaign on some or all of the lines that I have indicated in various letters ought to put you in a place where you get a good salary for doing what you would want to do in any case.
I’ve a rebellion against my authority on hand this morning; the Banner of the Collywobbles has been planted in the market-place; so I feel like any thing but writing. I have sent [illegible] to the front.
Love is the Law, Love under Will.
Fraternally,
Θ
|
in
in
