Mary Butts Diary Entry

Monday, 5 September 1921

Astral two nights ago.

Outside the deserted Abbey, coming down from above onto a shingle of millions of pebbles. Was trying to open a vault where something precious from the Abbey had been concealed. Bad ghosts came out and hindered. Some sat on the roof. Did not succeed—A person who said he was the adept who had helped me before came, but vanished when I said 'Do what thou wilt'.

Last night—heroin—Tried 'rising on the planes'—no success—but a voice said (something I have forgotten, but which seemed most important—It had bearing on the experience of the day before, after the terrible night, when I had taken nothing.

Next day. Some time before I had, as the result of a conversation with the Beast, tried to fix the vague illuminated states that usually spill out, and are forgotten—I made a formula, recalling the perception by an effort of will a certain number of times, from as many angles as possible—It was very successful—at the end I fixed both the perception, and [illegible] will [illegible] it.

A few days later, the daimon shewed me a grey crystal cut with facets and myself within it, and said that I should get [illegible] inside the crystal.

After that night, when we had told each other the worst, confessed that sins that are not confessed, and came into unearthly perception and blessedness and unity, we woke up next day exceedingly tired, and stiff, and cold. I could more easily remember what a purging and exaltation we had had, than feel it anymore. So I listened with the back of my mind for its echoes—I heard a strong sound, infinitely far off, like a dynamo, and understood that it was a force we had set in motion [illegible] away in some beaker where our vital sources are, and that I was intended to go straight back into my box of [illegible], and forget it, or at least not realise it anyway. The daimon came, and said look—it was like looking through a telescope, and into our archetypal world—very small but clear, full of geometric figures of grey crystal. A huge wheel was spinning, and it hummed off out of focus like a plane rising from the ground. It was a [illegible] glimpse of faces and objects large as this universe—I had a single peek, and the memory. It was what we had done—and it was impossible for us or any man to see it, only the daimon was doing his best [illegible] and when I told Cecil [Cecil Maitland] he went into an ecstasy because I had been able to see it, and my attainment was like his own. Also he understood what I meant. We had another night like it, but gayer, but first I recalled the child's peek into the archetypal world, seven times, with furious concentration—(it should have been quieter) and claimed my right to see [illegible] and evoked the daimon seven times to illuminate me.

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