|
Aleister Crowley Diary Entry Wednesday, 30 May 1923
Die Mercury
1.11 a.m. Back from Tunis where I beat the Champion of the [chess] club,[1] Mr Ganouba, and saw Le Cabinet du Dr Calligari.
Ethyl Oxide dictated by the Beast 666 to Alostrael 31-666-31 [Leah Hirsig], Marsa Plage, Tunisie May 30, 1923. e.v.
2.30 p.m. A few minutes last night with Ethyl [Ether]. I don’t remember quite what question I asked. I was frightfully tired and ought not really to have attempted to work. But what I got was to write a book in which the story was that I had died and gone to Heaven. This was to give me an opportunity for all sorts of satires. I saw this book, later as a sequel to my Autohagiography, [The Confessions of Aleister Crowley] which idea, by the way, is funny in itself. I began to think of how to start the book. Chapter I must obviously be an account of my death. I thought of reporting this from various points of view. I saw that it was useless to parody a John Bull account for the same reason as ‘nobody can parody Owen Seaman’. But I got the faits divers report, verbatim, a plain statement of the facts with the sole comment ‘The deceased gentleman is believed to have been interested in literature’. I thought then and I think still that this was screamingly funny. And unquestionably Leah laughed. I am too lazy to analyse the joke but the analysis is very complex and interesting. I had better say no more or I shall get over my laziness.
3.13 p.m. [dictated] Ethyl Oxide. I sneer at the idea of the artificial extensions of the Human memory, i.e. Books of reference.[2] This is because I had thought that human knowledge or consciousness, i.e. any knowledge or consciousness was comprised within the limits of the human memory. And the thing at the bottom of my thought was that dictionaries and books of reference, and the like, did not build events into memory. I'm afraid the solution is that all things are changed by the gradual transformation of the subconscious.
This is another reason for sneering but not the one I sneered for. The question had arisen in my mind as to how many links of memory were possible, or at least, what was the record. I see that a great many of my own arguments depend, first of all, upon memory, and I see very clearly indeed that the failure of humanity to recognize my greatness depends very largely on the physiological fact that the average memory fails to retain more than about one tenth of what mine does. Hence, all my allusions fall flat and the chain of reasoning which I propose breaks down in their opinion when it gets beyond a certain number of links. The essential difficulty in proving the authenticity of the Book of the Law is that the proof requires a number of steps too large to be appreciated by the very vast majority of minds. It is very silly of me to keep on pointing out that every step is simple. Of course it is: every step always is.[3] What is baffling these people is the actual number of steps; anything more than five gives them a pain in the old place.
I don’t know what I started from and I don’t know where I brought up at, but I feel that I have proved it. Compare Neuburg's [Victor B. Neuburg] limerick
‘There was an old man on a roof, Who said, ‘I’m entirely aloof I cannot explain What is wrong with my brain But I feel I have absolute proof.’
But I feel I have absolute proof. From the above I am led to suspect that I may be in such a psychological condition that if Neuburg were actually present in a state of tumescence, it might be hard to say him nay.
The emotion aroused by dictating the above remarks and the more physical accidents involved therein, have completely destroyed the existence of any idea soever in my mind.
I began by objecting to the introduction of Neuburg, to the assumption that I wanted him. Then I think I went up the ladders of thought, and could only express what I had got to by the appreciation Hermes eimi.[4] Hermes Eimi (3.33 [p.m.])
3.34 (Question: What was the last I said?)
I was about to prove that nothing could possibly be done unless Truth is told about it; because the purport of the previous paragraph indicates that I want to have Neuburg pay court to me, which is not the case. Any one will do. My homosexual instinct is due to the idea of aesthetic admiration. If a man fucks a woman he admires her aesthetically. (I know it sounds nonsense—it is nonsense—nonsense—) When a man fucks me I want to know it is for my beauty.
This is against Freud. I want to make it clear that the lure of beauty is deeper than desire.[5]
Noisy devil.[6]
3.42 (LAUGH)
Loud gab.[6]
3.44 The most important revelations—have been lost for ever. This is a joking reproach.[5]
3.46 The importance of the above is to show that the satisfaction of the sex instinct is not the deepest thing in certain natures.
3.48 The animal laughs.[6] Anaesthetics are spoken of as if they were . . . .
3.53 That won't do. Light not right. I opened my eyes—or closed them—and my thought switched to something else. I then noted: some thoughts belong to the light in the room etc., etc.[5]
Put that in as a contribution to Psychology. I don’t know what the hell's the matter.
(Discussion)
At last.[6] Anaesthetics should be regarded as beneficial not as a horror. Christianity objects to any one relieving pain.
3.58 That's absurd. That involves the conspiracy theory (i.e. priestcraft).[5] The Dalai Lama is right to have the faithful eat his excrements. For my least thought is clothed, armed, and crowned; and it would be well worth while for the greatest University in the world to spend the next million years in studying the most stupid and superficial things I have to say. The above remark is perfectly true: it is also the root of megalomania in its most violent forms. I am now happy to tell you that the afternoon entertaining is over. Ladies and gentlemen will confer an obligation by mentioning us favourably to their friends.
4.02 p.m. Last night I discovered that time was a drug; the most deadly and bitter yet discovered; but on the whole, very good for one. (Certainly good for digestion!) Here’s the point. Is it one of those habit forming drugs that are so dangerous? It’s bitter to take. It gives one all the illusions, and it seems impossible to discover if it is doing one’s constitution harm or not; and it's also difficult to say whether I am not simply making an ingenious metaphor and whether there’s nothing in it but metaphor. But I mustn’t forget a perfectly good idea that I had a little while ago about the theory of the world taught children by school-masters and mistresses. It’s only natural that it should be a wish phantasm of people of that kind or rather an eidolon of people of that kind. In other words, all I understand of Nature that I learnt at school is really an eidolon of the kind of people that I used to know at that time.
4.40 p.m. Copy here what I did last night before sleeping on XXXI.
I feel certain that other Tarot Trumps besides XI and IX [XX?] might give XXXI as a double letter—also such combinations as PR might be elucidated as a unity in this way; e.g. PR = XVI plus XIX = 35 = AGLA (while XVI plus XV = 31 = OP or PO= 150: but what is 150?
XXI plus X = ThK = Saturn and Jupiter.
There should be one XXXI for Nu, another for Had, as well as XX plus XI for ShT.
XVIII plus XIII = Pisces, Scorpio [=150=]. NQ or QN = feminine principle. Glamour and death, the fish and the serpent, the vulva and the womb (Beetle in Pisces a crab-louse. Ask Battiscombe Gunn).
XVII plus XIV. SH or HS. Aquarius, Sagittarius. The Cloud and the Rainbow. The Star and the Archer, the self or goal, the Will or Way. XVI plus XV = OP, Virgo Mars, the male energy. The Devil and the Blasted Tower which is really a Phallus shooting forth lightnings of seed.
There are only 5 combinations. Therefore
[309] ShT = XX plus XI = ? Nu and Had 150 QN = XVIII plus XIII = Nu (La) 150 0P = XVI plus XV= Had (AL) [420] KTh = X plus XXI = R[a]-H[oor]-K[huit], Father of gods & universe [240?] 660 MR = XII plus XIX = H[oor]-P[aar]-Kiraatl, Mother & Son
Fra 0.P.V. [Norman Mudd] ought to be here to direct these experiments, and to catch the fine shades of meaning in my remarks: also to divine what they are about most of the time.[7]
5.25 I note again that it becomes constantly more obvious that the slightest causes of disturbance of thought must be eliminated once and for all before one can start with Ethyl [Ether] with any hope of success. Hence the iron rules of Yoga—quite unreasonable and stupid in themselves—are necessary to the beginner. One can hardly be too severe.
11.57 Guy de Maupassant’s ‘Promenade’—an old clerk to whom nothing had ever happened suddenly realizes the fact (apparently through the sunset impacing [sic] his subconscious) and hangs himself in the Bois. The average man and woman dreads The Beast 666 most of all for this reason, that His every word threatens to reveal to the bearer the utter emptiness and desolation of ‘normal’ life. (The above is one of the details of the general statement ‘People can’t stand being told the truth about themselves—or even about things all round.’)
1—The chess game is actually detailed in the manuscript of the diaries at this point, but not included here. 2—Note added later by Crowley. 3—The last line is a later insertion by Crowley. 4—The last two sentences were added later by Crowley and refer to an incident of the winter of 1916. 5—This last was added at a later date by Crowley. 6—Note by Alostrael [Leah Hirsig]. 7—A marginal note by Crowley added at a later date.
|