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Correspondence from Gerald Yorke to Charles Stansfeld Jones
19 December 1949.
Dear Jones,
I promised to send you anything I write on Yoga. I have now begun to write short essays on various aspects which will finally be worked up into a book. I enclose one which appears as Tantric Hedonism in the Occult Observer. Your criticism will be welcomed.
John Symonds Life of A.C. will be finished probably in the Spring. A publisher has been found and I will send you a copy when it comes out.
Last week I bought the following items: A.C.'s Magical Diary in his hand from March 1917 to March 1918 and a draft letter book Dec 1924 to Feb 1925. The first is short (5 single-spaced pages when typed_, but is of great interest, dealing with the Hermes Eimi = 418 discovery and experience. and the origin of the slogan "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law". It follows directly on your typescript of The Diary of a Magus June 28 1916 to March 6 1917, and is immediately followed by your Aesopus Island note-book. You should have a copy and I will make one for you if you say you would like it.
The letter book contains dictated drafts of A.C.'s letters Dec 1924 to Feb 1925. It contains his letter to you in Dec 1924 (undated in draft) and beginning "I shall now deal with your letter of Nov 15 . . . I telegraphed at once to Recnartus [Heinrich Tränker], etc". Then one to you as Parsival (again undated) "I was aware by virtue of my work of the passing of the O.H.O. [Outer Head of the Order] . . .". Then A.C. to Tränker dated 26 Dec 24 (5 single-spaced pages of typescript when copied) accepting his (A.C.'s) succession as O.H.O. Then there is another long letter with memorandum to T.[ränker] (8 single-spaced paged when typed) giving amongst other things an account of his (A.C.'s) relations with R. [Theodor Reuss]. These four items, with the copy you sent me of Tränker's letter and memorandum to you of 1 Nov 1924, give a fairly complete picture together with various letters and memoranda I have of the break with Tränker (these from another source). Would you like copies of the relevant parts of the letters to Tränker to complete your files? I could do them in duplicate, so that you could send a copy to Tränker, who probably lost his records when the Nazis suppressed O.T.O., etc. in Germany.
I still hope that you will review the position and send me a copy of The Diary of a Magus June 28 1916 to Mar 6 1917. I have had for over a year A.C.'s account in his own hand of the toad ceremony, so that you would no longer be responsible for letting any further person have the means for falling under such a curse (as you put it). To merely have the crucifixion ceremony, which is my position, gives an unbalanced picture of the episode. The last entry in the diary I bought last week is "July 19. Began G.[reat] M.[agic] R.[etirement] in Canoe on Hudson". You have a small black notebook which covers part or the whole of this. Could you not let me have a copy to complete the picture? I can also let you have a copy of A.C.'s diary of IX° workings for part of this period (I cannot give dates as Symonds is writing up this period at the moment and has my original). It seems such a pity that we should each have half of this period, instead of our each possessing the whole story. Anyway, you can have my half if you want it, as then the complete story does exist somewhere. If you sent me your only copies one at a time, I would copy at once and return to you, thus saving you the labour or expense of getting them copies.
I have just reread your Perfection and Manifestation letters. They make an unique series, and I shall always be grateful that I was privileged to receive them. It occurred to me when writing the above to look up the Word of the Equinox for Sept 1947, i.e. the period when he died, as it might have special significance in forecasting your immediate work as the Child. It is surprisingly relevant on the surface, but I have not tried to find any cabalistic parallel. Here it is. "The Word of the Equinox is brilliance (Ring settled on the last five letters.) AL.I.64. The Oracle of the Equinox is times (AL.II.36). The Omen of the Equinox is Hexagram VIII, Pî (love)".
One last request. Can you confirm for me for purposes of bibliography that Book 4 parts 3 and 4, although advertised for sale in Eqx III,1 [Equinox Vol. III, No. 1], were in fact never published? On the other hand if they were issued and you have copies, could you please send me the exact working of their title pages and the number of pages in each? This bibliography will appear as an appendix to John Symonds' Life of A.C. To date I have recorded 105 published items.
Yours in Truth and Justice, so far as I understand them; I do not think I am qualified to sign 'in Unity and Love', not having advanced that far.
Gerald Yorke.
P.S. If you send me the two diaries I will treat them in the same way as Liber 31 if you so desire.
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