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Aleister Crowley Diary Entry Monday, 21 May 1923
Die Luna
12.05 a.m. I have been worried since my arrival in Tunis by my Cursed Puritanism, my Nonconformist Conscience—ad nauseam. For, feeling that I am financially dependent on people who believe in my Genius. I think of that terribly cruel (but true) remark of Frank Harris to Oscar Wilde, ‘People get tired of holding up an empty sack’ and sweat blood lest I should a single moment to idleness, and so fall in honour towards their pure Love and Faith. I feel that it is up to me to do better work than I have ever done—though I know well enough, and they understand perfectly, that I am in real need of rest from nervous strain, the sense of responsibility, and all those very things that are implied in this Plan of Campaign.
11.15 a.m. Woke rather fresh and fit. But the same thing has happened again: I got a long and very important revelation last night, and can't recall a single thing about it.
10.15 p.m. [Dictated to Alostrael] [Leah Hirsig]. There seems to be much misunderstanding about the True Will. In argument people are always making assumptions which imply as uncaused will. The fact of a person being a gentleman is as much an ineluctable factor as any possible spiritual experience; in fact, it is possible, even probable, that a man may be misled by the enthusiasm of an illumination, and if should find apparent conflict between his spiritual duty and his duty to honour, it is almost sure evidence that a trap is being laid for him and he should unhesitatingly stick to the course which ordinary decency indicates. Error on such point is precisely the ‘folly’ anticipated in CCXX, I, 36, and I wish to say definitely, once and for all, that people who do not understand and accept this position have utterly failed to grasp the fundamental principles of the Law of Thelema, and may be expected to get themselves into all those kinds of trouble which result from uncriticized enthusiasm about the ‘revelations’ which are made to them; their great Qabalistic discoveries and similar mantraps.
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