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Notes of Conversations with Aleister Crowley concerning The Book of the Law, 1923, recorded by Norman Mudd
[Aleister Crowley speaking]
Aiwass communicated the Book of the Law to me. I received benefit therefrom. This having happened I cannot doubt that communication is possible and desirable.
[I (Norman Mudd) then enquire how this communication came about.]
[Crowley speaking.]
Although it was not the direct result of invocation, unless the successful invocation of Horus be accounted such, yet in view of the Magical tradition that communications of this type may and should result more or less directly from the use of ceremonial methods, and of the absence of any other reasonable theory which covers the facts, I am led to make experiments and to induce others to make experiments on the assumption that people trained in a) Magical b) Mystical c) Qabalistic arts are more likely than those not so trained to receive similar communications with such fullness and accuracy as enables them to withstand the severest criticism. (The original communication was made to Rose [Rose Kelly] but would obviously have come to nothing had I not been there to gestate and parturate the seed.) These experiments have been justified by such results as the books LXV, VII, 418, I, Ararita, and by such work as the editing of the Tao Teh King and the Yi [Yi King]. The validity of the methods is demonstrated by J. s. J. [John St. John]. Also by the success of those who have put them into practice with fidelity, energy and intelligence. Indirectly also by the quality of the failures and disasters which have accompanied experiments conducted in ways which I disapprove. Incidentally I have been able to predict results both of the wise and foolish virgins under my supervision.
The Book of the Law has therefore a double interest for me.
1. The Book itself possesses the value which it claims for itself. 2. I being appointed by the Book to the functions mentioned in I. 15, 20, 22, 26, 32, 36/7/8, 50/1/2, 57, 61/2/3 II. 5, 9, 22, 34-43, 54/5, 59/60, 70-74, 76-78 III. esp. vv 39, 42, 47
It is my special business to set people to obtain the Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel by such means as I have myself proved valid. By the word 'conversation' I understand communication similar to the Book of the Law as to origin, authority and value, each as may be suited to the nature and True Will of the aspirant or experimenter.
To recapitulate: The Book of the Law has twofold value
1. for its own sake 2. as evidence of the possibility of perfecting an instrument of knowledge possibly superior but in any case different in kind from anything previously known.
If you get 0 equals 2 firmly in mind you will be able o divine how I shall deal with any metaphysical problem. It is apparently trans-rational but consistent coherent and fertile.
1. Any quality which we possess we possess by definition in an absolute degree. It is wrong to speak of greater or less benevolence, courtesy, envy, etc. Either you have the quality or you have it not, and in point of fact I doubt if there is any quality which is not possessed in this absolute sense by all men equally.
2. As 0 equals 2 some indeterminate finite expression, so the character of a man which is a positive thing is determined by the cataclysm of the absolutes—the product of conflict.
We need only measure the positive things that interfere with the infinite qualities. These are measured by Energy or Action consumed (This is an imperfect statement).
I can either give five francs to a beggar or go to the movies. Which shall I do. I can offer my blood for transfusion to save the life of a) my best girl, b) my business rival, c) a stranger, d) a child, e) an enemy, which shall I do? "Rembrandt on the baby". One could make a very fair estimate from Yes or No answers of the relative proportions of prudence and benevolence in my character.
Note this is the 0 plus 2 again. We are no longer speaking of the infinite or absolute Prudence and Benevolence but of the debris which exists in a multitude of individual cases. I analyze the debris and find that 75% of my positive acts show Prudence outweighing Benevolence. Continue the process with all the other motives possible and you would obtain a numerical table which would enable you to arrange the relative strengths of these characteristics.
Digression. These qualities are absolute.
In the case of benevolence. Suppose I am asked to decide whether or not a benevolent action should be done, such action in no way involving myself or any other person except the victim of the benevolence. The answer will be invariable Yes.
Nuit is the totality of possibilities. "I am infinite space" means that infinite room to act in an infinite number of ways, for us etc. in order to explain itself. The chemical analogy is good. I take the gas hydrogen and investigate it physically. I obtain a very small number of data about it, and I only get really one aspect of its nature, though it is a somewhat complex aspect. If I want more information about hydrogen, I see how it acts with N, Cl, S, etc. Those other elements and combinations of elements are the Nuit to the Hadit which we call hydrogen; but we should also include in the idea of Nuit the physical properties.
Hydrogen can distinguish itself from Oxygen in matter of atomic weight, from Cl in the matter of colour. All these categories are ultimately of the same nature. They are the possibilities of hydrogen. And without Nuit in this sense of the word hydrogen is nothing at all.
Carbon is capable of satisfying itself with 4 atoms of carbon or two of oxygen etc. But if partially satisfied with one there remains only a partial satisfaction for the other, CH3 has room for a cl. If you want to be a little more prudent you must be a little less benevolent and so on.
We measure qualities as against each other by the amount of energy which they display. There are some men in whom avarice never yields to generosity, compassion, any such opposite motive. That extreme case we mark Avarice infinity, generosity zero. That is measured by the test cases; 100 out of 100 determines the action.
If we analyze any actual act we shall find that practically all motives are involved directly or indirectly. (Surely these are the instincts.)
What sort of life shall I have in China, Marsa, Cefalu?
What constitutes the greatness of a man is the magnitude and significance of the part of Nuit which he has made contact with. When we get a number of men of wide experience, travel, education, we find it difficult to distinguish between. Points of agreement many, of difference few. So when a man becomes big enough he has to become a Master of the Temple, his ego begins to go. He begins to see that the ego is an impossible basis of such a complex structure.
Qualities like acidity, combustibility, which ultimately go when complexity exceeds a certain degree, are comparable to primitive passions, hate envy.
Qualities like polarity, fluorescence, are qualities that develop with complexity. They are not violent. The corresponding things in a man are the spiritual qualities.
How this fits in with the doctrine of crossing the Abyss.
Complex man begins to find himself in ideas which at first seem to him objective, e.g. enjoying poetry.
Incarnation.
So called successive lives are only separate in the illusory mode of time. They are like separate arbitrary sections of a picture. The reality is the picture which integrates all the aspects.
Ford making and word taking. An anecdote for the Hag. To show the ignorance and narrow mindedness of my mother. I was very bored with the game and gave her the Latin word tune. She was very offended.
A coster and his girl get up a dark alley one night. D'yer love us Bill? Yah (long pause) Then why don't yer muck us abaht? Bill thinks this over, reads up his Freud etc. and comes to the conclusion that there is hidden in these words something that might indicate that something in the nature of a would not be [illegible]. He was himself so far lacking in element of really Christian conduct that he consummated the marriage which had not yet taken place. (Another pause during which he adjusted his costume and she hers).
She then enquired as before "D'yer love us Bill?" This time he was not at a loss for an answer. There was no doubt in the case. He replied immediately.
How. The information came as something of a shock to her womanly tenderness and incidentally presented a psychological problem which she felt herself wholly incapable incompetent to solve on general principle.
She therefore put it to him in clear and forcible language as follows:
"Then why d'yer fuck us?"
Doubtless because his intelligence had been clarified by the physiological relief just obtained he explained his spiritual state intelligently enough though indirectly, his reply being couched in the form of another question.
"Why do I shit?"
Very instructive. Explains whole of English marriage. Of comment on CCXX.
Men feel the disgrace of the bestiality of fucking so acutely that they do everything possible to camouflage it. The whole point of Tennyson and Coventry Patmore, the explanation of their popularity, is their success in persuading the middle class people that marriage is a sacrament.
This falsity leads to all kinds of further confusion. They are compelled to act in all sorts of absurd ways to keep up the pretence that their animality is really romantic and refined. They hated Swinburne for proclaiming the sacredness of passion as opposed to weak emotionalism and fear me still more because I have analyzed the whole business so thoroughly.
Let me summarise my position.
1. The sexual act is a definitely animal gesture and needs no more justification than breathing. The impurity and falsehood come from trying to deny the plain facts of the case.
2.The close connection of sexual energy with the higher nervous centres makes the sexual act definitely magickal. It is therefore a sacrament which can and should be used in the Great Work.
3. The act being creative and ecstatic and active its vice consists in treating it as sentimental, emotional, passive.
4. It is thus the most important act possible to man (consider as under 2) yet wholly unimportant (as under 1). Modern ideas on the point err in both ways at once. The bourgeois diminishes the importance of the act by refusing it its place among the sacraments and by giving it the false importance which leads to prudery, sham romance, jealousy etc. etc.
Here is an actual example written down piping hot, fresh from the cow, of my method of subtle, perfectly good humoured, raillery. The enjoyment I get from it depends on the relief from mental strain of over work, and incidentally of satisfying a sort of obscure vanity of being able to talk sheer nonsense to a man without his discovery either that it is mere meaningless prattle or directed against his faculties of apprehension—on this particular instance the idea sprang spontaneously to birth principally I believe as a result of the high spirits into which I was thrown by the fact of the arrival of the possible victim.
A very brilliant young mathematical scholar named Saayman [Eddie Saayman] arrived from Oxford to spend part of the long vacation in the Abbey of Thelema at Marsa Plago near Tunis. He arrived just before tiffin and immediately after the meal we went to the beach to bathe. Suddenly a propos of nothing in particular I took it into my head to say
"I understand that you are a great Greek scholar."
He showed some natural surprise knowing that I knew that he knew a little Greek. I hastily apologised:—
"I beg your pardon. How stupid of me. I was thinking of Porson of course. I was misled by the similarity of the name."
His surprise increased with a bound. I was perfectly serious in my manner and showed every mark of expectation that he would see at once how the mistake had arisen. The names Saayman and Porson did not appear to him so closely resembling as to account for the mistake.
I apologised again. "Why yes, probably you do not know the inside of the story. . . . But the fact is that Porson for all his majesty of demeanour could unbend on occasions especially after dinner towards the end of his second bottle of port. on such occasions his intimates were wont to call him Baxter."
The unhappy mathematician began to wonder where there was not something amiss with his mind; how dense I must think him, but for the life of him he could not see that Baxter was much nearer to Saayman than Porson was.
I apologised once more. Hang it said I. It really is not fair of me. You probably do not know the end of the story. This he readily admitted. Hell said I. That explains the whole thing. The fact is that Porson had a favourite spaniel. And on one of these occasions a friend asked him "By the way Baxter how is that dog of yours?" The poor animal had been ailing for some days. Ah, said Porson with a heavy sigh. The poor old fellow dies last night. Dear me, said his friend, that's bad; you must be feeling cut up about it. He's been a faithful friend for many a year. "That he has" murmured the Doctor with the tears standing at the corner of his eye. I wouldn't have lost that dog for a CIO note.
There is no obvious reason why I should not have continued the reminiscence indefinitely. But poor Saayman was by this time so ashamed of himself for his stupidity that it would have been cruel to go on. He accordingly proceeded to an objective analysis of the dialogue.
The friend who had invited him to the Abbey knowing me somewhat better than the new arrival began to see the nature of his imbecility until I had tried to enlighten the superincumbent gloom by telling a couple of parallel stories. Saayman himself did not understand what had happened to him even on the fullest explanation, and for all I know he never will.
The moral of this is that suppose what might easily have been the case, that my victim had unworthy suspicions as to my entire benevolence towards an esteem for him, he might very easily have gone away smarting under a sense of obscure unprovoked and pointless insult.
One does not know everything. But we all know that there must always be an infinite variety of things beyond our comprehension. We therefore feel ashamed when people assume we understand anything which we feel is beyond us and ought not to be.
Then follows the P.O. story (Yes-No)
One would greet the Rev. F. F. Kelly as follows:—"Fine morning Mr. K." He would grow purple in the face and pluff and work his tonsils like a turkey and finally master his rage sufficiently to gobble out;—You are an insolent young man (gobbled). The meaning of this is that his son had hammered at him that Englishmen are so stupid that they could talk of nothing but the weather. Consequently any remark about the weather made to him was interpreted by him as a subtly insulting innuendo that he was a stupid Englishmen.
That is permitted and encouraged is admiration of the qualities of those people you love. This is the possible meaning of "If this he not aright. . . ." This was the Beast's amantia—terrible—twice. As long as you love reality, all right. All realities are by definition independent of illusion, of conditions. Therefore any phenomenon in time and space cannot be a reality. And to love any physical image of a star is idolatry and blasphemy against the star.
Memory.
I want to go into this with you as regards a) Practical Memory b) Magickal Memory c) The meaning of things.
A being, A, who was Cardinal Cazzo. He dies and goes to Heaven. On Buddhist principles Cardinal Cazzo has disappeared, but the bundle appears in heaven with sufficient identity with Cardinal Cazzo to be recognized by anyone who knew him. He may or may not have memory of this.
Now Cardinal Cazzo in his life time was confronted with this problem. Shall I bugger this boy? If I refrain my virtue will be such that there will be a being, A, enjoying himself in Heaven who would not otherwise be there. While if I indulge this unholy passion, there will be a being, A, in Hell who would not otherwise be there. If however in either case, A, does not think "I am here because when I was Cardinal Cazzo, I acted thus and not otherwise, then why should I, Cardinal Cazzo, act otherwise than my interests prompt me. In other words, motive always assumes the memory.
Notable, how when Beast wants to discuss important matters I am often tired or too preoccupied and vice versa; when I want to open a difficult question, ten to one Beast is tired or perhaps unwell.
I spoke about the desirability of not upsetting Eddie too much. Beast replied:
It may be a curious coincidence, but a few minutes ago I had a strange picture. I have a sort of regret for the fancy picture the elder Victorians made of England. Rosy old man in a jolly cottage. Rural pictures of England. Sort of Pickwick attitude. Even in unpleasant cases "Dodson and Fogg" are in a sense parts of a jolly tolerable condition. The shadows are a very beautiful picture. But as soon as a question is pushed home, it would have gone. Bad form. "The Wild Duck".
Here are three of us banded together in this strange place for a purpose. Hence a discipline and arrangement necessary. I [Norman Mudd] must not quarrel with position assigned.
Be on guard against the spirit of analysis.
The Canons of the Cinema ought to be our Magical Formula.
Hadit. If A is always at B and at C. clearly it cannot move from B to C. When I say I, what I am doing is to call attention to myself. Any other contradictory statement would be just as good.
Nephesch. is a sensible form of Nuit. The totality of possibilities of sensation.
Neschamah. the number of intelligible forms the will might assume.
Cursed be he who makes himself earth and woman heaven.
The girl who committed suicide because she had to put on her stockings every day was caused by a caged animal feeling. Contrast between monotony and known variety of life. How Thelema cures this.
Thou has no right but to do thy will.
Not sufficient to know one's own will and do it. Very important to keep off things that do not concern it.
Philosophical sociology has misconceived its problem by assuming that the problem was that of interrelating units of society, neglecting the fact (Thelema) that a preliminary adjustment of the unit to the universe was necessary and is necessary. Assumed dead units.
Conversation with a Jesuit. Anecdote Occurred when [I] had gone through everything from Plymouth Brethren—Catholicism—Nationalism—Black Magic—Buddhism—Mohamedanism—Hinduism—Church of England—Non-conformity—Paganism—Mysticism and had received Liber Legis earlier in the year.
Our preliminary skirmished ended in our failing to agree on just one fact, the historical truth of the Christian narrative. Examining the snag, we found that it really didn't matter at all because historical truth depends on evidence, and however convincing one way or the other, our ideas depended not on conviction but on faith, which is really a moral and not an intellectual quality, and is a form of the will, Chokma, quite unfettered by Ruach.
. I tried to find out to what I should be committing myself if I joined the Society of Jesus in terms of the essential principles which determine one's conduct in relation to one's own integrity and one's fellow men. He reassured me on the first point, saying that assuming my acquiescence in the aim of the Society of Jesus, I should have a free hand in carrying it out. As to the second point, I agreed with him that men would be happier in the sheer philosophical sense of the word if wisely herded, well fed, protected from disease and enemies, kept by ignorance and smooth optimistic assurances administered as a hypnotism; agreed that the alternative to his program was the disruption of society, the collapse of civilisation, the return to primitive barbarism, all this meaning the wholesale destruction of nations and the wreck of the whole system which we have constructed from the original anarchy of the savage. (Note the murder of Hiram as the first object of joint action, the sons conspiring to kill the father.)
First 7 degrees of masonry correspond to 7 chakras. 33 degree tongue torn out Chokmah. Mark Mason Head cut off. Royal Arch Behold and hear the name of God. Penalty blindness.
Missae Canon. Instructions for avoiding errors and performance exceedingly suggestive. Compare Catholic Mass and Gnostic Mass.
Communion of saints equals religious value of copulating with your magical partner.
Commit creed to memory.
VIAOV. Holy Book of the Sacred Words with essays on them.
Real difference with Jesuit that of SIN. Granting your God is everything you claim and granting that there is such a thing as sin against his law, my instinct will be to do that sin.
ASWA ——prick THELEMA ——anus
Arabic spellings required and find out Hebrew words with identical meanings and similar sounds.
Greek for Restriction, Sin. List of such words in AL as suggest deeper meanings.
Air the direct intellectual apprehension of the reflection given in water.
Air and Water. Water presents images which are apprehended by immediate intuition. Any attempt to describe their nature must fail as being limited to some particular aspect of their nature.
Example. Number. Take idea number. I claim to possess an absolute comprehension of number but if asked to define the word I find myself compelled to do so seriatim, and the series is infinite. No is the number of the true statements which I make about number.
Re Misunderstanding between Men.
Assuming we have all identical intuitions of what we mean by such words as truth, decency, pain, faith, the moment we attempt to communicate on the subject, we find a conflict between A's pet definition of the word and B's. They quarrel because they are both persuaded that their pat definition covers the whole ground.
[illegible] . . . having arisen from Air to water all the variety of his ideas on any subject have become settled and harmonised and stilled in that pure fluid. And just because he reflects perfectly the ideas which fall upon his surface, just because he understands, he becomes unintelligible and inarticulate. (This the case against argument).
The question arises. Is it possible to construct a dialectic method of communication between any two men in respect of such intuitions? In practice, we know that there exists a sympathy between individuals in respect of the deeper strats of their beings. Thus Sodomites recognise each other instinctively, and even less highly developed men often experience flashes of intuition about the common interest in things like poetry.
Possible method of communication. Thoth. The connection with the idea that Thoth is the real devil [illegible] Beast's call upon Thoth.
Aleister Crowley to be chiefly known to history as giver of a method of communication with has hitherto been doomed to silence. . . . Qabalah explains relations between deepest kind of moral idea, and literal and numerical value. One can check one's deduction.
Thelema gives a perfect moral code. Mind your own business. Understanding of this is necessary preliminary to technical training. Order of Limbs of Yoga is correct. Start with Yama and Niyama in an Abbey of Thelema.
Emotional clouding. Visitors to Cauchemar. Deceptive appearance of significance about emotions.
A cancer by the river's brim A carcinoma was to him And it was nothing more
Trained to complete indifference to every moral pressure.
Chess a medium of Psycho-Analysis.
March 1912 No. 7 Eqx. Published. Quotations there from earlier than publication of facsimile. In transcription of the MSS there appear passages not in the MSS "I adore thee in the Song" "Under curator" translation. "Abstruction" Replica made subsequently. Image. Bronze hawk at Cefalu. Bought. Wrote letter to fifteen people from Cairo "Eqx. of Gods come"
1. Ivor Back probably has copy. Consulting surgeon London. His father a great explorer of Egypt. In Cairo at time. 2. George Cecil Jones, Chemist. 3. Gerald Kelly. 4. Rev. F. F. Kelly. 5. Norman Collie? 6. Travers, Morris. 8. Allan Bennett. 9. Ernest Radcliffe? Commissioner in Kashmir. 10. Edward Threnton Martin and Co., Calcutta. 11. Eckenstein Oscar. 7 years. 12. MacGregor Mathers. Probably. 13. Elaine Simpson "Fidelis", Married.
In Bagh-i-Muattar account of 49 servitors of Beelzebub obtained sometime in 12 months following.
Production of Beetles. A beetle sent to Jones from Boleskine to ask him to determine its species. He replied that at S. Kensington, they couldn't identify it (June to Dec. 1904).
Three typed copies [of Liber Legis] made in Cairo. One used by publishers of Zaehnsdorf edition (Chiswick Press) previous to re-discovery of MSS. Errors in vellum books due to the fact that this typescript not properly checked from MSS. Two and three no memory.
What was sent to Fuller [J.F.C. Fuller] as Book of the Law? Presumably typescript.
Not been in Egypt since May, June 1905?
Book refers to Stele [Stélé of Revealing]. Probable that incidents connected with Stele were of date March, April 1904.
G.C. Jones objected to AL on grounds of Chap III. Suggested a dirty type of Allah or Jehovah.
A child born June 28, 1904 was given as first name Nuit.
An Ether Talk. Work of any man must be broken and unfinished. Common idea false. Unfinished Tintoretto. Rodin's method of conscious [illegible] expresses his perception of real truth, that his work is not something for all eternity. . . . Whole universe is a thing unfinished and unfinishable. Chaos is come again. How destructive this perception might be.
The Communication Question Ether. Is communication possible?
Horrible taste that time. Reminds me of cant of G. Gilderslieve (curiously yellow and metallic. Reference due to recent memory of the things I went through in that ordeal. I was reading that book and all its trivial circumstances became significant).
Something metallic about? (No!)
You're putting this down verbatim I hope (No) because it all bears on your question.
The Rich Man from the west may not be a sympathiser but a bitter opponent who does not understand what we are doing (laughter Ha Ha)
Showing another man the disgrace [disguise?] of one's own particular deities. You put me on my honour.
Before giving answer in formal statement, I thought I might [illegible] it in some made up word e.g. AUM—and I being expert in all such words—good one. Had to restrict myself to quite unusual accuracy.
No universe is possible without communication as first step. Chokmah second Sephiroth. That's what makes me fed up. Everything somehow confirms the Tree of Life. The construction of Tree must be quire praeterhuman.
Communication is one of the essential things about idea of duality.
Etymology of communication.
It is possible by initiation. But there is a limit to significance of scope of this answer. The answer is a message from Gods on the subject as opposed to the truth on the subject.
Further back alternative was [way?] submission to authority and Anarchy, two real opposites. One of the things that struck me was that Anarchy was the right thing in theory and other in practice—practice being a limited thing you see.
Complete picture of how invocation [inhalation?]—should be carried out. The preparation of the man. He has to be trained in ? self control ? Then having made the short preparation fasting in silence, darkness and so on, you arrange to intoxicate him in some convenient manner; and he then becomes aware of whatever is true for him, e.g. to understand how a person could run screaming from accursed spot.
The necessity of watching the candidate evident. Minutest care. The minutest disturbance from the senses is fatal.
Shut the doors. There is a terrible noise. Recognised on second occasion a similar noise and realised that I was aware of it because the doors were open. I therefore said 'shut the door'. Stirring drink.
Abominable foulness. Black Magick. Learn that if I am to be examined in future take all pains to avoid disturbance.
It is direct evidence of wrongness when any large amount of drug is required. Means that not being in a proper state to perform the operation one required a fabulous quantity of the stimulant in order to first bring one up to the moment. Yoga is therefore right in insisting on supreme bodily health and mental health as the condition for attainment. Long training and habit the actual stimulus required to enable one to reach the highest or deepest conceptions is absolutely trivial.
Taking limitations of our human condition, etc. there is a method which one can apply to any man who desires the benefits of communication—that method being that roughly described above. We don't tell him anything. He simply discovers things for himself. We remain silent. The chap must be taught keeping record, keeping his memory in shape.
By initiation or communication one sees the becoming aware is consciousness of that which is already true but unapprehended. We enable a man to hear the voice the Knowledge and Conversation of his Holy Guardian Angel. See?
For all this I visualise a perfectly good scheme for training people, which I think only requires a little consideration to be practicable business and in order to get best results in a short time we should try to collect people who have been for a number of years devoting themselves to the Great Work. It does not matter how wrong method may have been. Query devoted Catholic and Mohammedan. Suppose we take them more or less in the rough Trances will confirm their beliefs and illusions in the most tremendous way.
Well people we are ready to initiate [cultivate?] them and see what happens. Try Barber. Weeks holiday. Aspiring to art. Rejected religion on pretty advanced grounds. Doubtful point whether one should stake everything on a big formality i.e. a week's silence, darkness etc. Then intoxicate, etc.—or whether we should make him s conscious participant in the experiment. First best save for persons very advanced intellectually. (Ether for me, Genesthai [C. F. Russell])
One of the chief lessons of this morning. No point in trying to get the truth obtain truth on any matter. Can only get a message from the Gods. Oracle. The idea was once could use this oracle business, be consulted by people about business troubles.
The Hag. In New Orleans I had the Beatific Vision for about 3 weeks without stopping and learned to contrast it with the Vision of Wonder which belongs to Binah. Beatific Vision takes any object of sense thought and rejoices in it as that. But the higher vision goes beyond all these objects. It contemplates the necessary relation between them and in so far as it can be said to have any existence [enthusiasm?] at all it is that of Wonder at ingenuity with which things are fitted into each other.
I found that the Buddhist instructions were highly unsatisfactory.
The Question of Wonder. Crack saying. Naive wonder—simplicity. Failure of naive wonder. You sweat blood to state truth simply (e.g. Taylor) and it eludes. Then you perceive this as the essential vitality of the nature of things and get a real sense of wonder. The methodological method of science viz simplicity.
There was an old man on a roof Who said I have absolute proof 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.
1904 Book of the Law 1604 Dee and Kelly working 1304 Jacques de B Molay 1004 704 The Hegira? At time of Christ there was a real Adept Apollonius of Tyana.
Elasticity of the way of the Tao. Perfect elasticity. Distinct from ( ) reaction. Right Action. Love under Will. Classic of Purity. When any two substances come together there is strain if the person in charge has lust of result. . . . forcing circumstances.
A proper scientific experiment does not prejudge results. Therefore if the scientists once get to see that they are their own proper subjects for experiment they should get the way of the Tao without trouble.
. . . To beginners it seems a hell of a lot to learn. In fact all part of one binomial expansion.
Ether. Creation!
Invoke Nuit. After struggle has died down one comes to a smoothness which would turn into rest which turns automatically into ecstacy—Not obvious why, but that was the ecstacy of creation.
When the 0 phase goes into the 2 phase. with the Pain of ——— You know. (Yes) That is what one has to look forward to. When all the irritations are stilled arises the creative genius and joy to produce the new universe.
You can use that formula on any scale you like. E.g. in reference to any experiment from Chemistry to Physics, human life, the Macrocosm. All the same. A universal magical formula.
Great poet representative of Zeitgiest. Much misunderstood by A. France. A man is recognised as great when world has come round to his view.
Liber C. Life principle of animals is red.
Life principle of vegetables is green
Spiritual significance of colours in 777.
Black is complete absorption of everything (way of Tao)
Black element of spirit is black and most frightful evil.
Black attached to it. e.g. names of demons.
Black represents disappearance of imperfection of colour absorption.
White represents disappearance of imperfection of colour by synthesis.
(possible difference between white and black magic)
Liberty no connection with looseness.
omela's ( ) inability to imagine that abstract philosophical questions could have any practical bearing. His slight alarm. Find out what most shocks and keep at it.
Shummy [Ninette Shumway]. Reads out legends in Cauchemar.
Arsehole Legend. My well-fucked arsehole shows its gratitude by squirting its diarrhoea diverting upon the reader's nose.
Chapters in Rabelais on the Herb. 1. Pantagruelion. Necessity for Abbey. 2. Rules of Magic. 3. Oracle. 4. Dramatis Personae.
The people Panurge consults.
Pantagruelion is the material basis of the magical energies, the substance into which you can put any magical energy you desire and will cause the desired result to appear in matter.
range . . . is Macroprosopus.
Monk is Garg's magical power (possibility).
Panurge the Fool. The unconscious, complete innocence plus perfect devilment.
Pantagruel, son of Gargantua therefore adept.
It must not be supposed to be an actual or even necessarily just account of what happens in the ether experience. It should however enable me on some future occasion to observe whether the facts really do respond.
Mountain Tops. Marriage. Frock coat. My London Tailor. [illegible] away by considerations of finance. My Paris Tailor. Series of efforts to bring up Paris Tailor into clear consciousness; with object of finding him after many years. Consideration of circumstances in which I first employed him. The emergency of having to get a coat for Monte Carlo and no time to go to London for one. Tailor disappears and Monte Carlo comes up. This suggests systems of playing roulette. Reminded of my adventures with crooks in Mexico and the pet [?] system. These systems applied not only to roulette but to the game of Monte. The game not suggested by the sound of the word.
The above train of thoughts is a purely imaginary illustration starting from an idea chosen at random on the spur of the moment in order to explain "fever" [?] thoughts. It must not be supposed to be a necessary, an actual, or even necessarily just account of what happens in the ether experience. It should however enable me on some future occasion to observe whether the facts really correspond.
Ibis 222 Thou shalt go. Therefore peculiarly sacred to Thoth.
Les faits de la construction sont negligable. Le jeu demande seulement x metres carrees. Un grand mure et un petit. Puis un paquet de. Le jeu est absolument sans danger. La femme peut jouer aussi bien que l'homme et pourtant. La vitesse des coups est superieure a celle de toute autre jeu. Ainsi vous avez un tres beau spectacle. et on pourra un prix.
Il faut introduire le jeu en offrant des prix au competition, des tournaments par example les Marsa Tunis Angles.
Le principe du jeu est que tous les coups sont egalement permis. On peut le frapper avec le main le pied la tete indifferement. Ca dont bien de variete et puis ca exercise tous les muscles du corps.
Commeil est tres facile de faire un coup ordinaire pour guardier un point il faut d'employer une intelligence tres superieure. Aussi chaque point est contests avec beaucoup d'achannement. Le football reste en jeu ordinairement pendant un grand nombre de coups et ca entend a produire un excitation beaucoup plus que le lawn tennis.
C'est tellement facile de repondre a chaque coup que pour garder un seul point il faut developer qualities estrangeres a celle quant se fugure comme suffisant pour une remporte la victoire. Aussi quioque quatre points constitue la partie il arrive souvent qu'un seul partie remplit trois quarts d'heure. On a ainsi une combination de tous les points D'interet quimenent le jeu a la popularite.
Il peut prolonger la saison la Marsa et arranger les dates des competitions afin de tirer la sociate du Tunis. Un moment ou ordinairement on reste a la cite on peut arranger a recommencer pour attirer les tourists.
Nature of a Mood: Define a mood as an eddy. Physiological. Analyse preceding few days. Worry. Fear of death. S. India. Result low level vitality. Naturally contemplate death. He analysed this. One special thing confirmed by others. When sick you do not fear death. The objection to death occurs when you are well or getting well. Suggest some sort of mystic safeguard to prevent animals going mad with terror.
In spring when like dying I will get well if I can discover any reason. Found book on Mind. When began to get well the common fear of death recurred. Mixture of impatience and disgust at disposal of body neatness complex. Why interested in this mess more than any other of equal size? Had got into habit of caring for it. Escaped from control. Method of Emedocles. Buddhist corpse meditations useful.
The idea of the crowned and conquering child is incompatible with that of Justice. He is Aleph the Fool and Justice is Lamed.
What is the letter of Aeon of Horus? Vau? No.
Mem suggests itself. The Hanged Man.
Age of Isis Daleth or He.
Innocence of child excludes idea of Justice. Working without lust of result, the spontaneity is the child nature.
Necessity for Hesod and Tiphereth being joined by He and no other. Charioteer must join Binah and Geburah. Geburah is Energy, Binah the Understanding. The Holy Graal informs the Energy from the Understanding. Distinguish between Zain-Gemini joining Binah to Tiphereth. Sympathy. All the Castor Pollux symbolism. No sacramental influence. Gets its information from Binah, intuition inspiration, etc.
How Chokmah communicates with Chesed by path of Vau. Taurus the Hierophant. Something sacramental. Chesed the paternal power, the authority of the mind. Tiphereth gets from Chokmah by path of He, femine Nuit—Star corresponds to sign of Aquarius the Water B. Aquarius an airy sign, the Kerub of the man. Hence it's relation to humanitarianism. How does the True Will convey its orders to the consciousness? Through Aquarius and no other. And influence from Chesed—Tiphereth thro' path of Yod-Hermit—Virgo-Hermes. The authoritative part of the mind explains what it is doing thro' this messenger Hermes. Yod the spermazoa, the vehicle of the unconscious, very secret. Informs you of its decision in a supremely intelligent way and yet one which could not be explained. On the other side, Geburah, the energy of the mind, informs you of what it is doing—it in its turn having been ordered to act by Chesed thro' the path of Teth, which represents the lordly force of the Son by means of Libra—Justice. This seems to imply that it feels the necessity of justifying its violence, feeling it has to prove to you that it has taken everything into consideration, and judged rightly about it.
The question now arises about Netzach—Yesod which are below Tiphereth. Shall we suppose that the force conveyed by Nun Samekh and Ayin respectively is in the reverse direction. Both currents are in motion. Netzach is the wish phantasm. Hod the conventional intellectual apprehension of the Universe. Yesod the formulation of the Ego as plastically determined by Netzach and Hod with the idea of reproducing itself not creatively.
Scorpio is vibration and watery. This is why it leads to wish phantasms. On other side Capricornus the Devil being a direct ecstatic outburst of the Ego creates a point of view. The straightness of the Capricorn forces explain why a wish phantasm should be feminine and fascinating, while the 'point of view' tho' equally illusory is clean and free from emotion.
Tiphereth acts on Yesod through Samekh-Sagittarius, a Jupiterian force echoing the Jupiter of Chesed. It is the paternal authority and power of creation expressed as a vector instead of a point. The Tarot trump is Temperance illustrating the transmutation of Ego by Alchemy with various pre. . . . . . about to balance The Alchemist being the feminine Angel (note the Archer equals Diana equals Jupiter). Thus this sign connects Jupiter and the Moon. It is therefore the proper sign for the Ego to reproduce itself in things reflected [in] lunar form by means of processes of generation.
How is Hod influenced by Netzach? Path of Pe. Very difficult.
How does Netzach affect Hod influence Yesod? Through 8 Tzaddi—the Emperor, Aries, i.e. the wish phantasm imposes itself on the image through this illusion of divine right. It is very arbitrary.
Hod influences Yesod through path of Resh which here represents the illusion of pride, vanity.
Influences upon Netzach and Hod from Chesed and Geburah respectively. The former is the path of Jupiter, lord of fortune. This easy. The authoritative part of mind, its creative paternal force determines the wish phantasm by a direct emanation of its own nature. The wheel is so to speak, his daughter. wheel He manifests himself through the wheel of fortune, the three gunas which represent varieties caused by chance. Hence the is like a series of pictures thrown on a screen by a oetrope.
How does Geburah introduce Hod? Mem. This means that the 'point of view' is bound to necessity as opposed to its voluntary determination by the wish of the Ego in Tiphereth through 8, the fact that this energy can only be translated into conscious perception by means of the reflection, i.e. the illusion of Matter, and this involves the destruction of the pure energy. It loses its nature by being reflected in this way.
Finally we have Malkuth determined by this triple illusion, 7, 8, 9. Netzach, Yesod and . It is the illusion which reflects these illusions and is therefore doubly illusory. The determines it through the path of Qoph, Pisces, Moon, sheer glamour, dream. The point of view imposes directly through Shin, the Last Judgment, a fixed idea which might almost be called prejudice. Yesod communicates to it through the sphere of Saturn and Earth. The darkness of the Astral Plane.
Any conscious thought is limited as to the degree of its validity by the possibility that the universe may be subjective. It is part of my distress and curse as a Magus that I can't give a sanction of a higher order than applies to all propositions alike. Standard illustration. My conviction that I exist. There is no meaning in the statement I do not exist. I think it will do me good to bathe in the sea to-morrow. Now you might be able to convince me that I was wrong about that. I think it will not, etc. In each case the statement begins with the words I think. For purposes of casual conversation as distinct from abstract analytical investigation, paraphrase "It seems to me that it will do me good". Nothing can ever strengthen then. The appearance of God himself to guide me to a decisive consensus even the demonstration that I should be violating the law of contradiction to think otherwise would not take me out of the limitations expressed by "I think".
Golf papers tomorrow morning. A hole might be made in which the actual hole was invariably on a rather steep bank so that unless the ball went down, it would keep on rolling down hill. Call Sisyphus.
Wish Phantasms. Believing that life is an illusion and caused by the will, all phenomena may be interpreted as wish phantasms.
Tried to confute Berkely by strong argument, is argument in a circle. In confuting him, I have cut away the ground from under my feet. Whatever I think or say can be paraphrased in terms of formal logic i.e. as an equation which assumes the postulates of reason.
Explained I was very ill and cushions. She said she would get another pillow if any to spare. I said, if not bring ye a young fat girl in Marsa. Says plenty Jewesses. Yes, but wash her first—certainly they do smell very bad. She was a Sicilian.
Christianity ruined Europe economically through the Crusades. It has always been the policy of Rome to destroy the strong by whatever means seems handy. At the present time, she is working to ferment disorder of every kind in every non-Catholic country in order to establish the syllogism whose conclusion is "Peace on earth, good will to all men depends on complete submission to Papal domination".
It is never merely a question of heresy, the repulse of the direct attack Rome follows the principle of Lao tze by trying to nip in the bud any effort of humanity to progress in any way, seeing only too clearly that if the race should escape in any direction from universal ignorance, servility and superstition, the Church is in danger. For this reason, it is not sufficient to muzzle the hyena. Huxley was absolutely right in saying that Rome would reestablish the Inquisition in its worst form if it could destroy every form of secular strength. She realises the power of money and is therefore, against the Jews as such; pretending to stand for social order, she encourages Kaiserism and Bolshevism impartially, seeing in their success a triumph of anarchy so intolerable that her disciples will be invited to come to the rescue. The Italian political situation at the moment illustrates this with singular lucidity. (See Belloc) The Vatican tried to crush Mussolini fearing his apparent strength. When he fell into the trap of accepting the symbols of power without constitutional support Rome immediately shifted her ground and made him do what she wanted as the price of escaping immediate destruction. Having got him entirely into her power, she disowned her own party, forbidding Bon Safrzo [?] to proceed with his progress for restoring the temporal power. She knows that she is not strong enough to accept that power, in her own name. She prefers to govern in the name of bourgeois resistance to Bolshevism. When the moment arrives, she will abandon Mussolini. Italy will be plunged into anarchy and the Pope will point out that social security is a function of ultramontanism. I have no doubt that the Vatican is preparing a social revolution in Italy, hoping to escape destruction by posing as a political innocent and alternatively acquiescing in the martyrdom of her priests as a means of regaining the sympathy of humanitarians. There is only one means of counteracting this policy, which is to destroy the organisation of the Romish church, root and branch. Unless Christianity is wiped out once and for all and the next generation brought up in freedom from its intrigues, the Church will survive the social chaos as being the sole body armed with a single intelligible principle of action. Provided that we can destroy her at her headquarters, she will transfer them to America which is already almost wholly in her power. She can flourish in the U.S.A. because of the ignorance and disorder which have resulted from the immigration of the scourings of the slums of Europe and the consequent unwieldiness of government. The American constitution contemplated a semi-Taoistic regime, of independent States composed of homogenous units. This explains why the principle of Jefferson has become impracticable; when the crises arose it was necessary to appoint a megalomaniac dictator. The disintegration of the Protestant Churches in America and the appearance of monstrous abortive movements like Christian Science has left America with no effective defence against Rome but Freemasonry and the Craft, powerful in Europe because of its devotion to a definite spiritual and ethical ideal has become corrupt in America by its prostitution to business ambitions. Nevertheless, the ultimate struggle in the States must be between Jesus Christ and Hiram-Abiff. Freemasonry having lost its moral sublimity, will disintegrate and the entire political and social system will be involved in the crash. Rome will then be able to point to the catastrophe as an additional evidence that its own system of demanding that man should abdicate every form of independence is the only alternative to collapse. (Rome's argument has always been things like the French Revolution as direct result of Voltaire, etc.)
They already quote not only the French Revolution but the social disorganisation of England which was the logical consequence of Henry VIII's breach with Rome; they even quote the Russian revolution as an indirect argument pointing to the same conclusion. Once the principle of despotic authority was given up, even when that authority is alien to themselves, communism must ensue. The principle of compromise represented by Kerensky and Liberalism generally breaks down in one direction or the other, either by the dissolution of all decency or the rise of an arbitrary autocrat like Cromwell or Napoleon, whose power (getting based on individual genius limited by the span of human life and not on a moral principle independent of periodic change) vanishes at the touch of time.
They even claim that the scrimmage of 1914 was the logical consequence of Luther's heresy. They brand the reformation as a sexual and intellectual rebellion on the sphere of morals and intellect.
These arguments are formally irrefutable and therefore since their claim is an anachronism, the conclusion of the matter is that the sole way of escape for humanity is that it should accept a spiritual and moral principle adequate to the Zeitgeist. This principle is evidently the Law of Thelema, since it satisfies the conditions of political necessity and is at the same time, not repugnant to the present stage of human understanding.
The 4 worlds, Yetz, Briah, etc. Doctrine of 4 worlds. World of Atzlth (or Archetz) is the world of any idea as it is irrespective of condition (Kether). The Briah (or Creative world) (Chokmah and Binah) gives this idea a philosophic form: Chokmah states its intention in the matter, and Binah gives an intelligible form to the principle. The Yetziratic world (Sephiroth 4-9) is the world of the Ruach, the Formative world, shows this idea expanded intellectually with reference to the varying conditions in which it is proposed to embody this idea in actuality. (The Sephiroth being so numerous). They represent the plastic possibilities. The world is formative in the sense in which a sculptor puts a bit of clay here and takes it off there.
The world of Assaiah (The Material world) (Malkuth) shows the reflection of this idea in a fixed form. The formative world is shifting so that its images are "half formed faces". Only when the Ruach has become steady, when the form of the idea has been fixed intellectually is it possible for a concrete image to appear. The formation of these material images are necessary consequences of the work of the Creative world.
Abramelin. The current is too strong to appear in any one people continuously. No two important reincarnations consecutive in same race. Frenchmen, N. African, Italian, Dutch, German, S.E. Europe. Kelly (Welsh or Irish.
Put among Mexican part [of Crowley's Confessions] an account of letters L.P.D. To go in Hag Cryptic and Coptic. (Happened in winter, 1902-3). . . . During this period. I somehow became aware that I had been Cagliostro and received the mysteries of L.P.D.
For Alostrael, a copy of ritual for initiating a high priest of LIL (First Aethyr)—(contains possible data of historical value) Perhaps in America.
Look of the Spirit of the Living God. Little Jap vellum book.
Nemo repents fuit turpitziessimus A supper is sinking a well shaft was striken by death by shelfshaft But Hindenburg said Much better dead Cadaver werening Gessellschaft
The secret of winning at chess. While meeting the immediate emergency, concentrate on violating general principles as little as possible.
We carry put our experiments without reference to the welfare of our bodies. This is suggested by Dumas. It explained the lines
(In bed with a bitch)
This is condition of good work somehow. Impossible to do good work if worried by conditions considerations of health and fortune. Dumas contrasts Balsamo with Althotas. Althotas is very anxious to get Elixir of Life prepared and to prolong his days. Balsamo seems rather careless about it and is reproached for not looking after the old man better. Althotas talks about the callousness of youth yet in reality Balsamo has lived for many more years than Althotas. He shows the contrast between the two policies, that of clinging to earth, and that of being independent of it. (pp. 1-152)
Briatic world. How a minute event grows to a tremendous size. Decent man who suffers a murderous attack.
Mme Dubarry episode. King wants to fuck Mme DuBarry. The fetter of etiquette. How fatal it may be.
Writing nonsense. Neuburg [Victor B. Neuburg]. L.[ewis] Carroll. Nonsense a positive thing. Not sufficient to derange sense. So difficult to write because it is a perfect symbol of the Universe. Trance called "Universal Joke". Universe is supreme example of nonsense. See chapters in Book of Lies. Freud and Bergson's book on Laughter. Good hunting. Original joke is scaring the body.
Truth an inexpressible thing. Untruth an illusion.
Americans cannot understand irony because they have no background of truth. For an irony to be understood, it must be certain to the hearer that the ostensible sense is not to be taken and if you haven't got a background of truth, you cannot tell that.
You make a statement so extravagant that its evident meaning lies behind the words. We might define irony as a means of conveying a truth by means of a falsehood and the amusement connected with it is perhaps due to an appreciation of the wit and skill necessary to couch the truth in so incongruous a fashion.
With lust of result. Always anxious to be successful but would never take a reward. Degree, Mountaineering, Chess, Poetry. When can see way to success, I drop it. Result is that from point of view of outside world, I seem to have failed in everything I have undertaken. I am content with the knowledge that I am capable. This is a subconscious thing. Got on so well because I made such a gorgeous picture of what I should get. Then stopped it. Necessary to work an illusion in this way. But not slave to the illusion. Writers spoiled. Become slaves to public and publishers. Always to do the thing for its own sake. Happiness in biological sense in free action of faculties. This spoilt if you take the edge off ecstacy by tying oneself down to the grosser forms of illusion. Prize fighter. Begins by just enjoying the scrap. When successful becomes prey of backer, etc. Has to fight when he doesn't want to fight in the least. His lust of result really ruins his happiness, self respect, self contentment. He is no longer doing the thing for its own sake, not acting freely in fact. Happiness is acting freely and fully without other consideration. Refusal to accept as a method.
Complex. Different senses according to context. . . . A Khu is a complex. All individuals are one in a sense. Your Hadit is not different from mine. Love of Keats is not a complex. But hate of Keats is so.
The Black Brother absolute complex, a complete knot in continuity; shut himself up. Resist the strain. Individual existence maintained against the law of spiritual gravitation. Neschamah necessary to understand this. From this point of view the Great Work replacing of Rauch by Nechamah.
In what way does Neschamah enter in consciousness? Lewis Carroll Neschamic. Nonsense rhymes. Why the fascination? It indicates a truth that is unsusceptible by being stated in intellectual language. Get the Alice in Wonderland books. Ultimately, we get unanalyzable ideas which must simply be accepted as self-intelligible or unknown. Therefore, intelligible is the mother of the intellectual, the dark womb from which that child came.
Do not attempt to reduce the sphere of this intelligible but to expand it. Identify consciousness with these ultimates. Poetry of the best type stimulates your Neschamah.
For Hag. Talisman to stop bad dreams. Exra Jennings. Method for controlling a dream. Certain mystery of Nephesch concerned with Nightmare. What is it that withdraws when one sleeps? What is it that suffers when the animal is discomforted? Sleep and death negative phenomena.
When a writer mixed up reasonable stuff with extravagance, reason was a) camouflage b) because he could not convey some subtlety otherwise, e.g. Alchemical stuff.
Do what thou wilt. Secret is "free working", "free functioning".
In divination section. Finding houses, apartments by Geomancy, etc. When Saturn passed Libra before—no misfortune. But this time it started right away. Passes his Sun definitely at Eqx.
Possible causes of friction. Divination. 1. Oracle of Thelema 2. Yi King have been our guides. Keep him informed of probable visitors.
That there is no redemption after all.
Perfection of Malkuth. The whole point of one's conduct of life depends on a proper understanding of the point raised in Ch. 4, v of Liber LXV. Not limiting Malkuth. Error is to regard one's own Nepesch as somehow transparent. (Diff. is to ? is to oneself in a disembodied state). The solution lies in perfection of development of the Astral Body.
In man. Unable to do astral visions. Harder you try the more difficult in mental things.
The Force of the imagination is as the square of the will.
Kremnophobia. Star fear. Batrachophrenoboocosmomathis. Mountain fear.
Hag. One can always distinguish a Mexican or a man who has been there by the fact that he always blows through a cigarette before lighting it. The reason is this. Cigarettes were a state monopoly and are manufactured by convicts. These convicts have a certain ration of tobacco served to them every day; in order to increase the allowance, they secrete as much as they dare of the tobacco served to them for their work. They make up the weight by mixing the remainder with dust. Hence one blows through one's cigarette to get rid of the dust.
Reason is a lie. A lie is a double statement instead of a single one.
Marriage question. In Thelema all states of life are equally honourable.
There are small differences in the conduct of a woman which make her psychology almost intelligible to man. She thus furnishes a hint of what monsters may exist if we only change the anatomical structure very slightly. We can therefore imagine an infinite number of orders of being and of worlds utterly inscrutable to us though perhaps quite near us on the scale of being. This sort of analysis leads directly to the Abyss but in rather a bad sense. It is very dangerous to invoke the Devil.
We are in an experimental stage. As soon as all the forces are successfully brought into connection with each other the result can only be smash. (a draw at chess). Deadlock in chess an analogy of the whole course of a Manvantara.
Peace unutterable. A series. Stage I. Absence of disturbance. . . . The stilling of all movement and then the occurrence of that kind of motion which cannot be described as a disturbance. (Folded into itself. Look this up in the poetry).
[The remaining sayings, etc. are dated from 50 rue Vavin about February 1924.]
Ether discourses. E. 1. A parturition so difficult that the child has to be given ether.
E. 2. I have discovered the foundation of Good Manners. What is it? Ah! The impertinence of the young! You are the last person in The WORLD to whom I should think of communicating such a matter. There! if you get an exact note of all these tones you have again the gamut of my thought.
E. 3. A lot of pretty pretty about Shelley that goes with his thin voice. (Gives a quotation from Adonais about falling tear and weeping billow).
E. 4. I shall give you a hint about the foundation of good manners. People really do make up their minds themselves about things and are not really influenced by committees of great aunts who fall in on them for tea.
The difference between ourselves and the Americans is that we realise this and American don't.
E. 11. Magazine-Picture-Article
E.5. ditto ditto ditto the perfect symbol of effluorescence.
E. 6. An alleged joke and its analysis. I am floating in rosy bowers. Think of a Browning quotation about rosy bowers. (See Sludge about Queen Elizabeth and Lady Jane Grey). That accounts for the rosy tinge. (This is the joke.) Explanation. Queen Elizabeth was a bloody bitch and Lady Jane Grey had her head cut off.
E. 7. Back to Lady Jane Grey! I must get into the sphere of pure fire you see. You must keep a very good account of this birth of mine. It's going to be very useful one day.
E. 8. (Nina [Nina Hamnett] mentioned Fox) This is exactly what I want to take me to the sphere of pure fire.
E. 9. This is an extremely inquisitive fox.
E. 10. The caverns are so large and so terrible because it is never intended that any human being shall get through them. I could never have got through without the fox. The fox knew a short way out. You mustn't suppose I trust the fox. He has tried once already to lure me against his better judgment. I reproved him.
E. 11. The fall of Babelkund is possibly one of the best of Dunsany's stories.
E. 12. Lenin was right you see. That is the extent of my tribute to him.
E. 13. Your judgments right about stationary.
E. 14. The caverns turn into picture galleries but that only makes it worse.
E. 15. When asked where my friend was, I should have said he was just entering the sphere of pure fire under the guidance of a fox. Possibly planned this rebirth years ago—year before war, January 14-January 24. Ten years. Paris Working. Lenin surrounded by first class men Jane Chéron Lenin surrounded by Chinese (before) Jane Chéron
E. 16. George Foxe and Nina's fox. Which occurred first?
E. 17. A magnificent part is that of the messenger between Edward IV and King Lewis of France asking the hand of the Lady. . . . in marriage. Study the part.
Harris' Fire Water.
Initiation Ltd. Prose and poetry must not be lumped together as Literature. There is a special sacredness in poetry.
Article about the Queen of the Quarter in Vanity Fair.
Possible that Gog and Magog really were Lenin and Trotsky, and that Trotsky too had to die before I can come forward. No evidence for this of course.
Understood this afternoon, the philosophy of G.K.C. [G.K. Chesterton]. Nothing constructive, mere reversal. Standing on head. Take world of 1200. Every one looking forward to a more or less happy state after death, something permanent, simply straightforward. G.K.C. crowd are right more or less in saying life has become fatuous. No one really knows or believes beyond the moment, except a few artists.
Our forefathers fed the people on Shakespeare and the Bible, and fed their bodies on honest natural food, whereas today we feed their bodies and minds on garbage.
I ask a person with a bull's head at a cross road. He says I shall require a guide. Another man appears. Smiles rather superiorally and tells me wt. is a large plate and that I must specify the particular place I wish to visit. I object to the idea of a guide as probably the fox in disguise. Fox suddenly darting through looking glass in drawing room in Tenniel's illustration where Alice is about to go through. I see nothing of picture but looking glass itself. A number of relevant thoughts occur such as this:—I have had to wait for success through the attacks made on me by the Looking Glass and similar rational thoughts. Such are not accompanied by visions. I return to the young boating blood.
[The beginning of this Ether experiment appears to be missing.] O.P.V. [Norman Mudd] what especially about what? It's importance to life. The objection to this. Much thought of gravitation. How is wt. suggested in the various arts? He brightens up. "While we go along, will you have a cigarette?" Very glad but I have to get home to Babalon. Oh, you know her. Oh, yes, I see you have her book. Starts whistling, which I see now, is to answer that question. Tune becomes impudent, which means question is not precise. Laughs in my face and stops whistling with a long drawn whistle like train coming out of a tunnel. I stare blankly. "Oh, come along, to hell with that fellow. He's a slow coach."
All this time country roads like Cambridge in May term. Suddenly appears a building similar to ACB [Albert T.] Hall. Produces tickets. He makes a joke. "This is a country concert" immediately showing a vast lower torso from waist to knee of a woman, the cunt very wide and prominent. He identifies it with the Albert Hall place. "Aren't we going in?" Replies rather sneeringly, "Don't you really know all about it now". Meanwhile extraordinary enormous stage, curtain up, rehearsal of an opera, very few people about. Rock and forest scenery, very gay, semi-tropical, interruption from an enormous steam hammer large as stage that banged down. Didn't interfere with scenery. Like a phantom hammer. Reminds me of first steam hammer I saw as a little boy at Portsmouth. Associates wt. of hammer and din of naval workshops. The opera has begun. I hear the orchestra perfectly. It's a very heavy score. All the loudest instruments going strong far in the base. I say to my friend protestingly. "To hell with you. Why did you give me this art first (when I know least about it I added under my breath)". "Because you know least about it". My question evoked the vision of white children. I was asking "Why A should have died before B?" and so on. There are several details (useless to put down) about this. The word forge comes to mind connected with the title of the opera. The stage is empty. Then an immensely fat prima donna loaded with jewels waddles on with a vast bouquet of enamelled iron flowers as used for mourning in France. This is a joke. One of C's comments on how wt. is suggested by music. She is now joined by the tenor de Retsky also very fat. He is dressed in light clothes but I suspect he is there because last time I saw him he was singing Lohengrin in armour. Another joke about suggesting weight. Also that night, he sang very flat which again suggests wt. apparently through some obscure suggestion of a flat iron, of which I get a persistent vision. In fact, I am obsessed by it or rather it helps me to concentrate while dictating this account. (Half formed vision of soprano like pouter pigeon.)
Digression about B Conn who has similar breasts. I wander right away into thoughts of a recent note to her. Brought back by overture stopping with a tremendous clangout of finale. The prima donna begins to sing. Boating man makes me look down his throat—A vast tunnel full of fish. The words come 'gurgling', which describes her singing very well. The fish swim more slowly, the music is now slow and not so loud. I realise that the soprano's throat is the Rhine in Das Reingelt which immediately brings up the rocks with the Nauds sitting on it. Boating man whispers "wt. is suggested by diluting melodies". I shake my head puzzled. He points to a fish which is dying, gasping for breath. I understand by this (yes, I'm coming—by introduction of long phrases into the interstices of a melody causing it to gasp is one way of suggesting wt. Just as he pointed to the fish I heard the voice of our Lady of the Stars calling me home. Light suddenly go out in the theatre except the dusky glow over the Rhine Gold itself. I started to walk off stage but sank through boards and find myself on a heath, a place like Clapham Common in the cold wet weather. And I shall come right back to this bed. I didn't open my eyes but I saw you, O.P.V. shake your head very gloomily in disapproval of the vision. That vision of my rational thought "O.P.V. won't be impressed by this experiment". Mrs. Zeno. It suddenly flashes into my mind that the name, I think, of the soprano is Mrs. Zeno
(Fat woman soprano. Second contralto.) Memory picture of Estelle Terschel (Fat). The fat drummer of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, whom I knew in New York. I hear a voice "—the money we ought to make".
I thought of Lenin in connection with the idea that he and Trotsky were my forerunners and the three of us were to be denounced as insane in three separate ways.
Nest thought: his dying slogan "Kill the Jews and save Russia". Next Webster's square caricatures. Caricatures of Jews, just portraits, all hideous, nearly all strongly sympathetic to me arousing thoughts contrary to Lenin.
The connection there is: The Daily Mail suggested Lenin's being crazy in one way and Trotsky in another. It quoted that slogan and it published Webster's stuff. Within the last day or two, Webster has a caricature of a Jew billiard player, very hideous, asleep in bed, jumped on by John Roberts. The Jews in the caricature I saw, were not fixed on the paper but moving across it. They were hideous because everything Webster does is hideous and so are most Jews in my eyes; but the appeared sympathetic because of my strong personal sympathy for many Jews I have known and for their literature. This morning I was thinking of Reuben Goldsmith, a Jew, and of introducing to his notice, my books with Jewish titles, Aceldama, Ahab, Berashith, Jephthah, Jezebel. Possibly Roberts jumping on the Jew is connected with Lenin's slogan, yet I was in perfect sympathy with John Roberts as against the modern, smart shenny billiard-sharp, whose brag had excited Webster's repartee. I had been consciously sympathetic with Lenin and his slogan in a sort of off handed way, but when I got Lenin and slogan in vision there was immediately awakened a very alive answer which took the form of an imaginary picture. It is the precise details that I want to explain. I omitted one thing, perhaps because I can't see explanation off hand. The Jews in imaginary picture were I think were all half length and arrived in quite separate groups sometimes one, sometimes three and so on. All I can remember were seen three-quarter face. I can't explain exactly why they were thus mutilated, distributed and aspected.
I think they moved to remind me that the question concerned living Jews, not puppets of journalism.
Possible explanation. Some other caricature of Webster's recently seen containing figures similarly disposed.
There is a picture in Saturday's paper (23 February) concerning Sargent's picture "The Synagogue" and a Jewish squabble.
As energy "degrades". Atoms can either settle down to a sluggish molecule like a wax (apart from unsettling settling like T.N.T.) or concentrate to atoms of more complex quality, so reaching a stability of a different kind. They can settle to complex inert atoms like gold or to complex violent atoms, like radium. Au like wax, radium like T.N.T. The middle course is the formation of vital atoms like those being capable of starting new orders (or types) of increased-complexity-stability.
NOTE T.N.T. is stable as wax in the same sense that the lust of its elements for love under will is temporarily satisfied. There remains no lust to join as a whole with a new element.
Midnight to 2. A great discourse with the Beast. The first fruits of wisdom after rebirth.
1. Dillon in "The Harbour" employed to straighten out 170 miles of coast.
2. Beast's plan for straightening out society exists in his subconscious. A comprehension of essence of Thelemic application. A subconscious pattern.
3. Destruction of newspapers.
4. Futility of giving public as a whole, cheap literature (Mill and Marx)—not of first class. They should prepare themselves for serious reading (Mill and Marx) by reading frivolities like Shakespeare.
5. Questionnaires for people at Abbey after each week. Effect of discontinuing newspapers.
6. 666 the Great Fool. Innocent. Half witted. His public school and university training, plus his fortune provided him with an armour which concealed the fact. A simpleton though he can often fool the shallow. His cock-a-hoopiness at having written a book which the most respectable publisher O.K.'d.
7. When he gets down to bedrock the Puritanism comes out. In matter of sex, line drawn there. Sex must be kept in its place. Its position on Tree (Yesod) in middle pillar gives it extraordinary power to invade the other Sephiroth. Tiphereth and Daath have similar ability to invade. Daath worst because usurps the functions of Supernals. This Achad's [Charles Stansfeld Jones] error. He has made a false Kether in Daath. Says I have helped him to answer letters more simply. 666 to issue the Will. 31-666-31 to embody it in form. O.P.V. to expand it in terms of Intellect. Vindication. Success is your proof. Get going positively and Vindication will look after itself. Can acquire energy by training oneself to avoid fatigue. [illegible]. This one aspect of error of counting. Story of Beniah. Not to count when asking for money. If Poincare comes for an interview with 666, I shall have to elucidate afterwards.
"Ought stands for Nothing". One should be sufficiently master of circumstances to write poetry in any condition whatever. This is evidence of mastery. Nonsense is sense analysed. The words of the insane are mountain tops.
I have shown a way of bringing the unconsciousness to the conscious. That is why I am a Hierophant.
The remarkable phenomena of Platitudes and proverbial wisdom. The Comment is a well thought scheme for applying 93. Limitations of 666's mind. Its unconscious axioms.
[The following is in Aleister Crowley's hand.]
9:30 P.M. I am awake from recording (in my sleep) an imaginary book by Cabell. I am its hero. A brutal saint called Demtrius. A banquet is in progress. He rises. "Demetrius exclaimed in the coarse tones of two of the principal personages present, one after the other: This is the piece of meat for which I have to fight. He pointed to a lady of incomparable charm and distinction, an action pertaining to that large class which his ? forty years earlier had stigmatized as rude.
There flashed in divers quarters naked tools—some ivory, some steel —————"
Damn etcetera, and really now, rather, Damn it! Eh?
Glyphs. I was a tall buxom not very attractive woman in the 50's holding some important position. I had been being interviewed by some journalist. I had just gone out [to] my car outside 42nd St. Library, New York. The final question was a poser. I had confidence in my ability to answer it, but no glimmer of an idea what to say. Then I saw, quite out of connection with anything, one of those little cardboard slips (cigarette cards). Photograph, that of a tall slim young man in riding kit with a whip. And even as I wondered what this could have to do with the interview, I found myself smiling with subtle triumph; just as the chauffeur moved off I completed my sentence which had hung up after the word AND—with the words time will show.
The point of that photograph was a glyph of the reply which I couldn't find consciously. The portrait of the jockey suggested the uncertainty of the future. (A gentlemanly, feminine, jockey. Popular cheap cigarettes—commonplaceness of the reply. His smartness—the smartness of the reply.
If I have a thought in my mind consciously, a glyph arises corresponding with it. But this is cheating, not a real glyph.
Picture a glyph of the essential unconscious elements in my mind. Gives a clue to what I am going to think.
If it had come after would have been a mere picture.
Story No. 3.
[The first story appears to be missing]
I have been meditating the 10 impurities. I have traced the essential elements of my mind to their lairs. I find invariably that they are inherent in the child. Part of my illness is loss of control of the Sphincter Ani. With a towel between my buttocks and the slightest movements (cough, etc.) cause a small quantity of shit to exude. The essential contention of Freud that the unconscious is composed of elements of infantile ps, is correct and the remark flashes into my mind "The characteristic smell sticks to the fingers of the Professor".
We refuse indignantly to admit that meditation on shit form the major part of our ps.
Epigram combines the infantile and shit complexes of Freud in a very necessary manner and my humour phrased it in just such words as would annoy Freud most. Whole world of analysis in this story. More you think the deeper it is.
Sick Man's Fancy. My mind wanders back through long years to a very brilliant talented girl that I once knew. One of her pet sayings was "Give your best to the world and the world will give its best back to you". She was not a finished artist and she did not get all she wanted from giving what she thought her best. But the world applauded her third best and so she tried to sell it her sixth best. The result was that the world gave her pretty well its worst. The poor old world, vampire that she is, is starving for the life blood of a man which must be squeezed out with suffering, distilled and quintessentialised, and when that is done, she is no niggard of reward.
(with the compliments of Professor Freud.)
The women who like to wear precious stones do so in a spirit of emulation. They are envious of their reputation for hardness.
An example of prophecy. Some years from now I am walking with Leah [Leah Hirsig] along St. John's Street towards Trinity [Cambridge]. I am dressed in a rather rusty black frock coat and tall silk hat. I am limping slightly. A rather smart looking British youth approaches in a Trinity scholar's gown. I raise my hat politely to him. He thinks I want to ask him something and stops and returns my greeting very respectfully. I, still with my hat lifted, bow slightly and say "My congratulations". He stares. I add pontifically, "Young man, you will go far". I then proceeded. The incident stuck deeply in my mind. I watched his surprise in very minute detail. His mind is gradually flooded with waves of pride and pleasure, and by the time he has reached Sidney Street, he is all aglow and blushing. He either knew or found out who I was and recorded it in his Memoirs which he wrote after he had become Lord Chancellor as a genuine example of my prophetic power.
Can you give me the solution of the story? I had gone up to Cambridge to revel in old memories and to show Leah the place. Recognising the gown I was reminded of how we used to despise scholars in those days in our stupid snobbish ignorance. I therefore thought I would make a point of giving a magickal gesture symbolic of my subsequent enlightenment. "Congrats" meant that I recognised him as the visitor of a very large number of different kinds of fights. . . . I then thought I would penetrate what O.P.V. calls an impish freak and bewilder the young man by prophesying his success in life which was of course, a reasonable forecast, given the gown on one hand and his good personal appearance and manner on the other.
Suffering. Told in books narcotics cause constipation. When stopping them a long go, first thing that happens is loss of control of sphincter. Then tightens up.
Insanity of Beast. Any plan he makes is so nearly perfect that it must be adopted as it is or turned down at once. Should be a plan cut and dried of what to do with any man or woman we deal with.
Catastrophic aspect of AL. Civilization overwhelmed shortly by a calamity as a past civilization. Mechanism. Balance of town and country lost.
Sterility of France. Not enough people doing the peasant work to give the town people the power to live their artificial life.
Note. The yokel dissatisfied by all, of town, as doomed [?] by education and the cinema.
Why island. Because population cannot increase beyond definite limit. Therefore plainest common sense is to make love in all sorts of sterile ways. Fuel insufficient.
Moral difference between fox hunting and stag hunting. In stag hunting, you are setting a lower animal to attack a higher—hounds. Absolutely disgusting.
Cavern was fox's earth—gets bigger as you go in. The lower parts of sphere of fire are full of small deceits, horrid little disgusting deceitfulnesses [illegible].
You must get into your mind about my Ruach. I have to be born naked as a new born child in every respect. Best of we play the comedy of birth.
Fox was devil on one occasion. Just at point of birth.
[The following is on a scrap of paper in Aleister Crowley's hand.]
W.B. S. [William Seabrook] essentially false, cruel and restricted: 666 true, kind and free.
5.52. I now recognise the girl that challenged me at the first fence in this fox hunt as Kate [Kate Seabrook].
[The following two pieces of paper are in Norman Mudd's hand.]
Princess to be fairy godmother. I must be dressed accordingly. Gwendolen Otter.
Head of Quakers called Fox. Bid that train of thought occur before or after visit of Nina Hamnett?
[illegible] The admitted success due to her own shrewdness rather than to any teaching of his. Nevertheless he is the boy she wants, to keep her straight. First thing to do is for her to get her fitted with a position in the world. Cecil Grey got to put up that £20,000.
Another angle. Caverns. What about my going back that way. Enough courage in human breast to undergo anything. Got o get rid of all grossness, every particle. In past, I have at times turned aside from my True Will to some extent. Canp a la Juive at Laberouste. Hungering after the fleshpots. Not permitted any more that personal affection.
The p thing is single.
O.P.V. you had better write in your diary to this effect.
I thoroughly realize that the work of establishing the Law of Thelema, to which I am wholly dedicated for my whole life, demands first of all (a) the vindication of the reputation of A.C., (b) the provision of funds for A.C. to be free to carry out His work as the Beast 666. And I therefore formally pledge myself to devote the whole of my energies to this double task, not swerving therefrom until released by 666's written acknowledgement of my success. Also I pledge myself not to allow interior resistance to inhibit me by suggesting scruples arising from the slough of bourgeois morality.
Crowley Mixed Grill Two kidneys full of sauce Bernaise Two angels on horseback Two sausages, each having four anchovies laid across it, criss-cross fashion Mushrooms grilled ad lib.
Verrall. A consid. feminist. Dinner at home to a number of undergraduates. Mrs. Verrall. He was spouting feminism rather for her benefit with idea of taming our manly pride. Quoted passages from Pauline Epistles. How should we answer St. Paul? I sinking into earth with shame, found words coming into my mouth despite all my efforts. "I can only imagine Sir, how you would have answered St. Peter."
No blind man could have written Odyssey. Beast knows how landscape poetry is written. Apply same to Gospels. Nothing that would make one think writer familiar with things he describes.
Aleister Crowley Pictures. Can't judge unless a lot seen and for a time.
1. Surprised, 2. Revolted, 3. Puzzled, 4. Irritated, 5. Fascinated. People who have lived in house for 3 not tired. Go into Cauchemar for 40,000th time to see the pictures. The most remarkable of the pictures are in Master's earlier manner in the Naples collection.
Aleister Crowley to Philip Hazeltine. Dear H,
93
I want to see you. When are you coming over? It's no good my sending you odd Limericks. What I want to do is to go into the big prop[osition] and collect all the Lim[ericks] there are—at least so many as to form an ab[solutely] rep[resentative] coll[ection]. I know a v[ery] l[arge] n[umber] off by h[eart], but it is no good my copying them out until I know what you have.
Give my love to [Nina Hamnett]
I want to see her v[ery] soon.
But do come yourself. The talk we had was h[ighly] unsatisfactory because you insist on disapp[earing] without even leaving a gun [?] to places which well brought up typewriters refuse to [illegible]. The life of the best machines is only 9 or 10 years even if you take great care.
Co come before I flit to some remote desert and let us get something w[orth] while really going.
Aleister Crowley to Bertelli. Thank you very much for your advice yesterday afternoon. I am writing off to N. Hapgood at once. But at the best that is going to take some little time. I am at the moment without resturce or expectations for some while to come. My ill health on top of everything else has made it impossible for me to go about and get something going. I want you to try and find something that would put me into work right away and enable me to face the world until my luck turns. I expect to be in perfect health by this time next week and able to do anything. Here is one suggestion. There is a lot of talk at present about traversing the desert by motor. How would it be to make the long travers from Tunis via Toseur Ouargla and In-Salah to Timbuktu. The party would be headed ostensibly by a woman. I know one ready to go. (This journey is all the more interesting because it covers the ground of "L'Antlantide". The slave trade between Arabia and Abyssinia is said to be proceeding vigorously, despite remonstrances from the powers. Nobody knows the facts in any detail. At least they have not been written up. There should evidently be a story of the brightest yellow in this.
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