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Correspondence from George MacNie Cowie to Aleister Crowley
14 Glenisla Gardens, Edinburgh.
28 Dec 1916.
Care Frater.
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
Richard is partly himself again. I am profoundly thankful to have that clear and precise Note in my possession. Its necessity was not in the least foreseen in Sep but it was just the want of it that paralysed me these last two months and it has not come too soon. The little I have permitted myself to say gives you no notion of the extraordinary extent to which S.L. [William Steff-Langston] has taken possession of and constituted himself apparently Supreme Lord I could say but little being in—total ignorance as to whether or not you had written to him again or not. There did not seem anything in your first letter to justify him in posing as a confidential secretary, G.O. etc, whirling over my head and leaving me in ignorance as to what he is doing. I did not know but that you might have given him some reason to, and so had to wait.
I have now sent him a copy. The document is so precise that it needed but little comment and I have let him down the gentlest possible, as I know my man, now, and after swaggering around before the others as 'Grand Lodge' and so on, and seemingly passing me over, in spite of profuse protestations of loyalty, I know he will simply be sick—with mortification, poor chap. It's a pity, he might be so useful a man, but his weak point seems to be a vanity quite bye-ordina. My visit to London revealed that, in some very curious ways. I really don't know, but it wouldn't be like him if he hasn't made the most of the chance to do a stunt as Codlin's the friend, vice Short relegated to the gutter and ignore-able. A chance reference revealed the fact that he locks himself into the office daily and is heard pounding away for hours on the type-writer. no one knows what, he won't say, but quite likely it's the astrological data. Give him some more, do, to keep him out of mischief, get him to compile a forecast for 1918 to knock Zadkiel's Almanac into a cocked hat. He has too much spare time on his hands.
I was surprised at first that he was ready to spend so much (he isn't generous) on travelling. But he's been having the time of his life, and half a weeks free board and lodging from poor Mary [Mary Davies] weekly must be an offset. In these hard times she must be a bit 'fed up' with it and the extra work, tho' she says little and I doubt if it will occur to him to make any return.
In inspecting the bag in front I don't forget to give the bag behind a squint, or forget that I can be a d[amned] f[ool] myself. I certainly was in having said anything at all on so short an acquaintance about his chances. It's only doing him justice to say that nothing could be more straightforward or loyal than his reply to my letter, and I have taken him at his word.
There is still trouble however, and it would take a much wiser and stronger man than I to straighten it out. I could not foresee that he would take things in such deadly earnest and make the running of the Lodge almost his metier. He really knows so little of the history of the last few years, far less than Mary does and has perhaps mistaken the situation. There are things I can't tell him or Mary, private affairs of your own, not can I, without the danger of slandering you, because I do not fully understand your actual standpoint yet, say much or anything about the 'literary' history of the last two years 1914-15.[1] The promised enlightenment and 'piece of news' is still to seek.
I indicated in my last that he was inquiring about finance. He is now asking some quite pertinent questions of a kind sure to arise in any case, but to which you alone can reply—e.g. suppose say Bro[ther] W.D[avies] dies and leaves the amount of all the fees (say £30) he has paid in, to his son, we are legally bound by one of your clauses to pay that amount. Where does it come from? and so on. To the man in the street this seems a curious and very Irish provision. If everyone recovers all his fees at death what does the Order rub along on?
I have not replied to these posers yet, but when I do I shall say that, as in duty bound, I printed the manifesto exactly as you sent it, without question, tho' with some criticism after. I shall say that they are all pledged to accept the authority of the G[rand] M[aster] as absolute, and that if any such question arises from outsiders there is the fact that the Order does already possess some real estate, and that the manifesto evidently refers as if actually present, to a state of affairs that requires time for its full unfolding.
Between ourselves I cannot believe that you rely on the ability to fulfil all these promises merely on subscriptions etc. Experience shows that most people soon choke off and don't pay. My confidence in printing that rather challengable document is because I am sure that it is from the Knowledge, or from the promises in L.L. [Liber Legis] that you took to provide the solid basis of the things. Without this, the scheme has always I must frankly admit, looked to me chimerical. The above views however I keep to myself, for the present.
The remainder of this letter is missing.]
1—[This refers to Crowley's pro-German writings. Gerald Yorke.]
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