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Correspondence from Norman Mudd to J. Rimmer
Tunisia Palace Hotel, Tunis
Sept. 20, 1923. e.v.
J. Rimmer, Esq.,
Dear Sir,
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
I am instructed by Mr. Aleister Crowley (The Beast 666) to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of Sept. 4, which he has read with great interest and pleasure. He has asked me to reply to it, point by point, somewhat as follows.
1. As regards the Law of Thelema. It is a new revelation to mankind of the possibilities of spiritual development and attainment.
It is new in the sense that, though adumbrations of it, partial and impure, have been given by poets and prophesied for centuries past (Mohammed, Rabelais, Shakespeare, Schopenhauer, Blake, Nietzsche) no attempt was made to announce it as the central truth of the spiritual man. New also in the special sense that it has at last been given fully and perfectly to the world at the time when mankind everywhere was ready for it, when the old Formula (Death, Surrender, Self-sacrifice) had become definitely lifeless and out of date.
It is a revelation in the sense that it is not the creative work of the man who wrote it, but was written down by him (April 1904) at high speed from the dictation of an unseen person; as also in the sense that it evidently expresses the Will and Understanding of an Intelligence altogether praeter-human in power, scope, and illumination; in fact, by any ordinary standard, divine.
The Book of the Law (Liber AL vel Legis) which is the revelation, is published in No. X of Vol. I of the Equinox and the remaining nine numbers of Vol. I, together with No. I of Vol. III contain a great deal of comment and discussion of the book, including a statement of how it came into being. The EQUINOX is now very expensive to buy (Apply for information to J.G. Bayley [James Gilbert Bayley], 37 a Tressilian Road, Brockley, London S.E.4). But you should be able to consult it at the British Museum. A good deal of study of it is indispensable for any useful understanding of our work. Study in particular 'The Temple of Solomon the King' and the Official Instruction of A∴A∴
The root ideas of the Law of Thelema are given in the statements:
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. Love is the law, love under will. Thou hast no right but to do thy will. Do that and no other shall say nay. For pure will, unassuaged of purpose, delivered from the lust of result, is every way perfect.
One may give some slight notion of the most elementary meaning of these ideas as follows.
Every human being has, usually quite unknown to himself, a principle or centre of harmony and perfection, which we may call the True Will.
This True Will is, in the natural unilluminated unintiated man (which means all but one in millions) outside his conscious life altogether, being overlaid by the mass of weaknesses and complexes which modern psychology is beginning to study and classify (very timidly and externally, not with that heroic personal ruthlessness of the poets, saints and prophets which is alone of any avail.
The essential task of every man is to strip away ever more and more completely, these veils of his True Will, in order that the spiritual splendour of this central soul may irradiate his conscious life and unify it.
In this terrible task every man needs the loving and understanding guidance discipline and encouragement of one who has already worked out, in his own spirit, by tribulation of ordeal, the steps of this "Path of the Wise".
The significance of the Law as abstract doctrine and published truth about human nature is inseparably connected with the fact that its scribe and prophet, The Beast 666, and his woman called the Scarlet Woman, have not only the highest initiated understanding of the Law, but possess also a very perfect technique of initiation, whereby those who are willing to learn and work, devoting themselves wholly in singleness of purpose to this one task, may come to such realization of their True Wills as will transform their lives out of all comparison with the initial chaotic nullity.
Obey my prophet Follow out the ordeals of my knowledge Seek me only Then the joys of my love will redeem ye from all pain.
2. Sunday Express. A mass of silly falsehood. Don't believe this just because we say so. You must judge for yourself whenever you have the materials for judging. Your sense of the inner spirit of our Work and writings must suffice for the time.
3. Kramer [Jacob Kramer]. "I deliberately assumed a mask when posing for Kramer to prove to him that he had not the power of perceiving the truth about his sitter. I thought he had several of the qualities that go to produce genius and proposed to train him in spiritual insight and balanced judgment. He is in with a horrible crowd in London of drunken wasters. He will go to the devil unless he cuts them out.
4. Drugs. There is no point in merely arguing about drugs. The matter is too complex and requires of course long and intimate experimental study, fearless and scientific.
"I do not advocate them for all people (In the book [Diary of a Drug Fiend] Lamas says Lou has no use for them and should abstain). All I claim is that in a few quite unusual people there may occur occasional crises when the use of a drug of this kind might make the difference between failure and success just as Oxygen inhalations or strychnine injections might pull a man through a critical illness. It is therefore necessary to acquire full expert knowledge of their effects and of how to avoid disaster. Mankind must not hang its clothes on a hickory limb. We must not neglect any possible instrument of progress through fear. The arguments against drugs apply to chloroform, X Rays and flying.
I am inclined to agree that the true line of progress is to be determined by biological and physiological considerations; yet all knowledge is valuable. The study of drugs has certainly taught me more about psychology than almost any other line of research. That knowledge will serve mankind in its advance for perfection. I do not regret having risked my life and reason to drive salient into the lines of ignorance. All pioneers must take a chance. Incidentally I made a point in experimenting with drugs because of the unanimous opinion that they were too strong for man to master. I have proved the contrary.
5. Periodicity of inspiration. I do not understand what you mean by this. (Drugs form no part of the apparatus for spiritual development. Their only use is as a mental microscope by the use of which I can diagnose as Aspirant's spiritual condition in a day instead of a year.) Please explain this "periodicity of inspiration."
I am always interested in any theories of that kind and shall be pleased to help in any way to assist you in any research.
Counsel No. I—The Sphinx has four powers and one of them is to dare. Prudence is very well in its way but unless balanced by unshakable courage grows disproportionately and becomes cowardice. Don't suppose that I fail to see the parallel truth that courage unbalanced by prudence becomes reckless foolhardiness.
My fulminating proof is supplied by history. Observe the effects of prohibition in the United States of America. Contrast them with those of total abstinence in Islam. The difference is due to the Moslem refusing alcohol voluntarily by development of self-control. Observe too the excesses to which fear or narcotics and stimulants leads. Funk Cocaine and you end by funking coffee. I even knew one man who would not eat bread because it had undergone fermentation."
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