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Frank Bennett Diary Entry Monday, 24 October 1921
Monday. Got up about 7 o'clock. Did the usual housework in a sunny unconscious manner, feeling the Terrible and Beautiful effect of the previous night. My breast very sore with the three cuts; they appear now only mere scratches, but they bled very much. I want to be alone now. I may feel all right by noon.
11.20. Just back from Umbilicus, where I have carried water and looked after Lulu [Astarte Lulu Panthea]. While going there, I trembled in every limb to such an extent that my arms shook visibly. I did not feel ill, only weak. When I got to the house, I carried water, saw Lulu right, then went and sat out in the sun. I began to meditate on this strange thing, and it came to my mind like a flash: it is the mental part of you that is in open rebellion, and the only thing it can work with is the physical and mental body. This it does by putting them out of harmony with the rest of nature. Then I began to consider this, and came to the conclusion that it was so.
Now I had been trying for Magical Power to establish the Law. So I thought I would see if I had received any power or not. So I recited—'The silence speech begets' down to the end—'The light breaks forth from under.' Almost at once the vibrations began to slow down. I said: 'The physical mind has stood in my way for oh, so long…' and kept on with the verse for about five minutes, I should think, but that may not be so. I do not know whether I have broken my Oath or not. But I feel I have not. Anyhow I will cut my arm three times as penalty. It is now 3 pm—all signs of weakness gone. I lay down as soon as I had finished my Record at noon. I saw the whole Ceremony again very clearly: when the light streamed from the East, I felt myself growing very hot, and the mind was whirling upwards as a result of the Spiral Dance. I took the dance 11 circles, from outside circle to centre, slowly and halting. Then I extended from centre to circumference; but I do not know how many circles I did. I know I half fell, half sat on the floor of the Temple, and sat in my Asana. Then the Light came, and I grew hotter, until I must have lost consciousness in the physical body. When I became conscious, I was very cold.
[A Note from Aleister Crowley]
Wisdom says: be strong! Then canst thou bear more joy. The rapture is at present like a boy's early copulation—too eager, and yet too weak; the whole energy doesn't go into the work, while also there is a feeling of shyness and mental resistance, almost like a fear that he is doing something wrong.
But you are getting a great deal,
and it is far better than I had ventured to hope—again more
than all this, you know how to do it; it is only a question
of making a regular practice of the operation, with such
modifications as experience suggests. My own record of 1906 e.v. [The
Temple of Solomon the King], (The
Equinox, Vol. I, No. VIII, pp 13-47) may be of service.
I am sorry that it is not more fully worked out; also that
it is written with such uncalled for modesty. The symbol for
the present state is
[I Ching hexagram]
X,
Li,
But for your next move it is
[I Ching hexagram]
XXX,
Li. (Strange both being called Li!)
[I Ching hexagram]
[I Ching hexagram] Line 3. Beware of being self anxious; you must retain your childlike state and take your attainment as simply and naturally as a baby accepts sweets.
[I Ching hexagram] Line 4. 'The Lord cometh like a thief in the night.' 'Even as the lightening lighteneth out of the East and flasheth over into the West, so shall be the coming of the Son of Man'—the orgasm.
[I Ching hexagram] Line 5. The tears and groans are those of such orgasm.
ב and ע of ON, see O.T.O. Mss.)
[I Ching hexagram] Line 6. The 'charge of the Spirit.'
The Thelema message for you is:
'A feast every night unto her, and the pleasure of uttermost delight!'
Salma frater,
R.R. et A.C. [Rosae Rubeae et Aureae Crucis]. 666.
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