|
Correspondence from Aleister Crowley to Wilfred Talbot Smith
[On the paper of the Piccadilly Hotel.]
22 Apr [1933]
C∴F∴
93
I am pleased beyond measure at the photographs [of the Gnostic Mass]. Your work has been splendid: it is all far better than I had dared hope. En avent mes enfants.
One month later!! Interval occupied by lying at the point of death from mushroom poisoning. Dead broke, too, and wired you frantically and vainly a S.O.S. Luckily some friends put me up til I was better; but I'm going into the battle again on Monday with less than £10—an advance on that.
I am sure you people have no idea of the straits through which I have been passing. A dozen times in the last 9 months I have not known whether I should have a bed to sleep in or a meal. True, the Gods have always come along at the last moment, but I am stripped of every possession bar the clothes I stand in and a change of linen; so that I'm getting tired of being trained to handle big things bigly, as I have had to assume to be the case in order to keep sane.
Now that you are getting 45 people to the Mass, you ought to be able to raise money easily enough, both to start a fund for a permanent temple for your selves, and to help me to help you. I could do a lot in that way if I were to come over to California in the Fall. Via Panama all sea should not be too frightfully dear.
If you play your cards well, you can do it. As you say, the Priestess more than W.T.S. [Wilfred Talbot Smith]. But be dreadfully careful not to waste the Lance on pewter mugs! Watch for the big opportunity, and jump with both feet!
I'm still ill, so no more now.
Love and all blessings to all of you—and still more heartiest congratulations on having established the Mass.
93 93/93
Fraternally
666
|