THE VOICE OF FIRE
illustration: B.Van-Asten
Volume 1, Number 2. Autumn Equinox An CIX ☉ in 29° Virgo, ☽ in 7° Taurus.
Sunday 22nd September 2013 e.v.
'Draw into naught
All life, death, hatred, love:
All self concentred in the sole desire -
Hear thou the Voice of Fire!'
Tannhauser. Aleister Crowley.
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.
Love is the law, love under will.
Volume 1, Number 2 of the Voice of Fire is dedicated to Herbert Charles Jerome Pollitt
[1872-1942]
CONTENTS
Editorial
Liber DCCCXXXVII The Law of Liberty
At Boleskine
How sweet a passion
The Call of Choronzon, illustration
On reading Victor Neuburg's 'Larkspur'
Liber XXV The Star Ruby
Ode to Satan
Aleister Crowley's Family Tree
'I am that I am, the flame' from The Ship. A. Crowley.
The Wittering Post
Liber LXVII [OZ]
The Wand of Silence
The Magic Book Worm
Pegamina part two
EDITORIAL
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.
It is a common misconception to think that in order to be a practicing Thelemite one must belong to a Thelemic or magical society, such as the A∴A∴ or the OTO. Both organisations do outstanding work but it is not necessary, nor is it particularly advantageous to the aspirant to pursue this path if it is anathema to the will of the individual. Many magical groups, with the best intentions, contain an assortment of accelerated egos, all eager to make their magical mark which in certain circumstances can hinder the progress of the young neophyte. Conflicting ideas and differing approaches to magical work combined with internal power struggles is not a good recipe for spiritual advancement. ‘Bind nothing! Let there be no difference made among you between any one thing & any other thing; for thereby there cometh hurt.’ [Liber AL. I. 22]
Thelema accepts every true seeker into its Light: ‘Come forth, O children, under the stars, & take your fill of love!’ [Liber AL. I. 12] There is no prejudice or restriction, for the ‘word of Sin is Restriction.’ [Liber AL. I. 41] Thelema welcomes everyone, and all are equal, no matter what sex you may be, or your colour, nationality, age or sexuality and so on... all that is asked of you is a certain degree of mental capacity for understanding and for learning!
‘The Law is for all’ [Liber AL. I. 34]
In the modern world, with its technological advances and ever increasing demands upon our time, we must strive to find our ‘islands’ of calm in which to work. Any student of magick or Thelema who has chosen to work alone in accordance to their will and their own initiative, will find it perfectly effective to set their own course of study based upon the curriculum of the A∴A∴ [see ‘One Star in Sight’ in Magick in Theory and Practice, and also Liber LXI vel Causae; also of help will be ‘An Account of A∴A∴’]
But what of he or she who is seeking a magical teacher? There is a lot of nonsense in the occult world and the misuse of magick can have devastating consequences! A ‘grade’ or a ‘degree’ is awarded after a particular subject is understood, both in theory and practice, as in any university; we pursue our own course in attainment and any work which is overlooked will lead to our own downfall. It is self-destructive to avoid the work and there is only one way down from the edge of a precipice! Grades and titles have no power in themselves; they are an acknowledgement of work completed and not a device to impress or even intimidate the novice magician. In fact, following self-analysis and certain processes of illumination, one will see that all such figures of ‘authority’ are merely effigies on which to hang suitably impressive titles (of little real importance), be they King, Fish Monger or Arch Bishop! These trifles will not so much as disturb the calm waters into which one gazes on the spiritual quest and the Thelemite will see beyond such things! But of course, this does not mean that one can ignore one’s moral and social duties and go beyond the law which governs society – ‘Do what thou wilt’ does not suggest that we can do whatever we like and to hell with the consequences, for anyone who has studied the works of Aleister Crowley will understand their meaning and their importance, and those who do not and see it as a license for all sorts of negative and destructive behaviour are almost certainly beyond any spiritual help!
The aspirant to Thelema must prepare for the work and they must ensure that they have stable and suitable surroundings; they must work to provide the basic needs of living: a roof over one’s head and food on the table for good mental and physical well-being. Without such things the accomplishment of magical work will prove to be extremely difficult and disordered.
The aim of the Thelemite is the Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel and all work should be a preliminary step in that direction. The aspirant upon the path who has chosen to work alone, will know within when certain ordeals and tasks have been accomplished and will know whether or not to award the seal of a grade upon that work; they will know when to amend themselves a magical name or motto, for it is through hard work and diligence, without the lust of result that positive effects are produced and the Secret Chiefs will surely see this and provide guidance where necessary.
Let Liber AL be your Light, Magick your strength and let common sense prevail!
Love is the law, love under will.
The Voice of Fire welcomes submissions (poetry, short stories, articles and reviews etc). Please send all submissions to the editor at barryvanasten418@hotmail.com
Liber DCCCXXXVII
The Law of Liberty
A Tract of ΤΟ ΜΕΓΑ ΘΗΡΙΟΝ 666
That is a Magus
9°=2□ A∴A∴
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
I
I AM OFTEN ASKED why I begin my letters in this way. No matter whether I am writing to my lady or to my butcher, always I begin with these eleven words. Why, how else should I begin? What other greeting could be so glad? Look, brother, we are free! Rejoice with me, sister, there is no law beyond Do what thou wilt!
II
I WRITE this for those who have not read our Sacred book, The Book of the Law, or for those who, reading it, have somehow failed to understand its perfection. For there are many matters in this Book, and the Glad Tidings are now here, now there, scattered throughout the Book as the Stars are scattered through the field of Night. Rejoice with me, all ye people! At the very head of the Book stands the great charter of our godhead: “Every man and every woman is a star.” We are all free, all independent, all shining gloriously, each one a radiant world. Is not that good tidings?
Then comes the first call of the Great Goddess Nuit, Lady of the Starry Heaven, who is also Matter in its deepest metaphysical sense, who is the infinite in whom all we live and move and have our being. Hear Her first summons to us men and women: “Come forth, o children, under the stars, & take your fill of love! I am above you and in you. My ecstasy is in yours. My joy is to see your joy.” Later She explains the mystery of sorrow: “For I am divided for love's sake, for the chance of union.”
“This is the creation of the world, that the pain of division is as nothing, and the joy of dissolution all.”
It is shown later how this can be, how death itself is an ecstasy like love, but more intense, the reunion of the soul with its true self.
And what are the conditions of this joy, and peace, and glory? Is ours the gloomy asceticism of the Christian, and the Buddhist, and the Hindu? Are we walking in eternal fear lest some “sin” should cut us off from “grace”? By no means.
“Be goodly therefore: dress ye all in fine apparel; eat rich foods and drink sweet wines and wines that foam! Also, take your fill and will of love as ye will, when, where, and with whom ye will! But always unto me.”
This is the only point to bear in mind, that every act must be a ritual, an act of worship, a sacrament. Live as the kings and princes, crowned and uncrowned, of this world, have always lived, as masters always live; but let it not be self-indulgence; make your self-indulgence your religion.
When you drink and dance and take delight, you are not being “immoral,” you are not “risking your immortal soul”; you are fulfilling the precepts of our holy religion—provided only that you remember to regard your actions in this light. Do not lower yourself and destroy and cheapen your pleasure by leaving out the supreme joy, the consciousness of the Peace that passeth understanding. Do not embrace mere Marian or Melusine; she is Nuit Herself, specially concentrated and incarnated in a human form to give you infinite love, to bid you taste even on earth the Elixir of Immortality. “But ecstasy be thine and joy of earth: ever To me! To me!”
Again She speaks: “Love is the law, love under will.” Keep pure your highest ideal; strive ever toward it without allowing aught to stop you or turn you aside, even as a star sweeps upon its incalculable and infinite course of glory, and all is Love. The Law of your being becomes Light, Life, Love and Liberty. All is peace, all is harmony and beauty, all is joy.
For hear, how gracious is the Goddess; “I give unimaginable joys on earth: certainty, not faith, while in life, upon death; peace unutterable, rest, ecstasy; nor do I demand aught in sacrifice.”
Is this not better than the death-in-life of the slaves of the Slave-Gods, as they go oppressed by consciousness of “sin,” wearily seeking or simulating wearisome and tedious “virtues”?
With such, we who have accepted the Law of Thelema have nothing to do. We have heard the Voice of the Star-Goddess: “I love you! I yearn to you! Pale or purple, veiled or voluptuous, I who am all pleasure and purple, and drunkenness of the innermost sense, desire you. Put on the wings, and arouse the coiled splendour within you: come unto me!” And thus She ends:
“Sing the rapturous love-song unto me! Burn to me perfumes! Wear to me jewels! Drink to me, for I love you! I love you! I am the blue-lidded daughter of Sunset; I am the naked brilliance of the voluptuous night-sky. To me! To me!” And with these words “The Manifestation of Nuit is at an end.”
III
IN THE NEXT CHAPTER of our book is given the word of Hadit, who is the complement of Nuit. He is eternal energy, the Infinite Motion of Things, the central core of all being. The manifested Universe comes from the marriage of Nuit and Hadit; without this could no thing be. This eternal, this perpetual marriage-feast is then the nature of things themselves; and therefore everything that is, is a crystallization of divine ecstasy.
Hadit tells us of Himself: “I am the flame that burns in every heart of man, and in the core of every star.” He is then your own inmost divine self; it is you, and not another, who are lost in the constant rapture of the embraces of Infinite Beauty. A little further on He speaks of us:
“We are not for the poor and the sad: the lords of the earth are our kinsfolk.”
“Is a God to live in a dog? No! but the highest are of us. They shall rejoice, our chosen: who sorroweth is not of us.”
“Beauty and strength, leaping laughter and delicious languor, force and fire, are of us.” Later, concerning death, He says: “Think not, o king, upon that lie: That Thou Must Die: verily thou shalt not die, but live. Now let it be understood: If the body of the King dissolve, he shall remain in pure ecstasy for ever.” When you know that, what is left but delight? And how are we to live meanwhile?
“It is a lie, this folly against self—Be strong, o man! lust, enjoy all things of sense and rapture: fear not that any God shall deny thee for this.”
Again and again, in words like these, He sees the expansion and the development of the soul through joy.
Here is the Calendar of our Church: “But ye, o my people, rise up & awake! Let the rituals be rightly performed with joy & beauty!” Remember that all acts of love and pleasure are rituals, must be rituals. “There are rituals of the elements and feasts of the times. A feast for the first night of the Prophet and his Bride! A feast for the three days of the writing of the Book of the Law. A feast for Tahuti and the child of the Prophet—secret, o Prophet! A feast for the Supreme Ritual, and a feast for the Equinox of the Gods. A feast for fire and a feast for water; a feast for life and a greater feast for death! A feast every day in your hearts in the joy of my rapture! A feast every night unto Nu, and the pleasure of uttermost delight! Aye! feast! rejoice! there is no dread hereafter. There is the dissolution, and eternal ecstasy in the kisses of Nu.” It all depends on your own acceptance of this new law, and you are not asked to believe anything, to accept a string of foolish fables beneath the intellectual level of a Bushman and the moral level of a drug-fiend. All you have to do is to be yourself, to do your will, and to rejoice.
“Dost thou fail? Art thou sorry? Is fear in thine heart?” He says again: “Where I am, these are not.” There is much more of the same kind; enough has been quoted already to make all clear. But there is a further injunction. “Wisdom says: be strong! Then canst thou bear more joy. Be not animal; refine thy rapture! If thou drink, drink by the eight and ninety rules of art: if thou love, exceed by delicacy; and if thou do aught joyous, let there be subtlety therein! But exceed! exceed! Strive ever to more! and if thou art truly mine—and doubt it not, an if thou art ever joyous!—death is the crown of all.”
Lift yourselves up, my brothers and sisters of the earth! Put beneath your feet all fears, all qualms, all hesitancies! Lift yourselves up! Come forth, free and joyous, by night and day, to do your will; for “There is no law beyond Do what thou wilt.” Lift yourselves up! Walk forth with us in Light and Life and Love and Liberty, taking our pleasure as Kings and Queens in Heaven and on Earth.
The sun is arisen; the spectre of the ages has been put to flight. “The word of Sin is Restriction,” or as it has been otherwise said on this text: That is Sin, to hold thine holy spirit in!
Go on, go on in thy might; and let no man make thee afraid.
Love is the law, love under will.
[Liber 837. The Equinox. Volume III, number I. 1919]
AT BOLESKINE
Oh wizard, tend my body, do,
And plant kisses in the garden of time;
Conjure spells that thunder through
My soul's sweet sleep sublime.
And if in haste, this world should be
Torn from our hearts, and thrown
From century to idle century
In the garden, overgrown...
Wand of desire, this love shall be
A rose-lipped hell of our own making...
In the dull roar of his monster voice - the sea!
A rough sea over the rocks was breaking!
And time will twist as our hearts fade
To the ceaseless echo, and remain
Nameless, deciphering the horror that's made
As we dance between the Devil and the Divine, again!
Hail to thee, great rapture of my heart;
I have sought the glory of thy name.
Let Love crown our souls in this Royal Art;
Let Love linger long in the hour of our fame!
And dark is the water that we know,
And steep the hill that we climb.
Oh passion, oh prophet, I fearless, grow
Towards a new dawn, touched by your time!
Barry Van-Asten
HOW SWEET A PASSION
ALEISTER CROWLEY AND
HERBERT CHARLES JEROME POLLITT
by AUDRAREP
He who seduced me first I could not forget.
I hardly loved him but desired to taste
A new strong sin. My sorrow does not fret
That sore. But thou, whose sudden arms embraced
My shrinking body, and who brought a blush
Into my cheeks, and turned my veins to fire,
Thou, who didst whelm me with the eager rush
Of the enormous floods of thy desire,
Thine are the kisses that devour me yet,
Thine the high heaven whose loss is death to me,
Thine all the barbed arrows of regret,
Thine on whose arms I yearn to be
In my deep heart thy name is writ alone,
Men shall decipher -when they split the stone.
[‘untitled’ 5th poem from Crowley’s unpublished
small red
poetry notebook. Approximately 1898.
Gerald Yorke Collection]
It was towards the end of the October [Michaelmas] term of 1897 at Cambridge [1], aged just twenty-three, when Edward ‘Aleister’ Crowley met a remarkable man four years his senior named Herbert Charles Jerome Pollitt (b. 20th July 1871-1942) [2]. Born in Kendal, the son of Charles Pollitt (b. 1837), the proprietor of the ‘Westmorland Gazette’ and Jane Hutchinson (b. 1838 and married in Kendal 1864). In the 1881 census the Pollitt’s are living at 7 Kent Terrace in Kendal; Charles is a ‘newspaper proprietor, employing 14 men, 6 boys and 2 girls’. Herbert is a scholar aged nine and also at the address is Herbert’s younger brother Frank Bellingham Pollitt, aged seven (b. 1873 in Kendal and married in 1898 to Josephine Elizabeth Jordan b. 1877). Herbert or Jerome as he preferred to be called went up to Trinity College Cambridge in 1889 and graduated with a B.A. degree in 1892 (and later an M.A. in 1896). Herbert’s mother Jane died in the winter of 1891 aged 55 in Kendal. Unfortunately Jerome did not qualify as a doctor but he turned to his other great love, the stage. Jerome danced in the Cambridge Footlights Dramatic Club as a female impersonator, calling himself Diane de Rougy, after the well known actress Liane de Puugy. After their first meeting at Trinity College, a firm friendship developed between Aleister and Jerome.
Crowley ‘had entered for the Moral Science Tripos [at Trinity] but he found himself repelled by political economy which was one of his subjects. He says nothing of the other subjects of his course, only that for one day of those three years he worked on a Greek play. He spent most of his time reading and writing poetry.’ [The Great Beast. John Symonds. 1951. 1973 revised ed P. 25)]. Crowley would not fall in line with the College’s routines if they were opposed to his own will and natural order; he would not be interfered with: ‘When I discovered that chapel was compulsory I immediately struck back. The junior dean halled me for not attending chapel, which I was certainly not going to do, because it involved early rising’. [The Confessions of Aleister Crowley. P. 108]
At Cambridge Crowley enjoyed the freedom he had yearned for in his adolescence – ‘I had the sensation of drawing a long deep breath as one does after swimming under water or [an even better analogy] as one does after bracing oneself against the pain inflicted by a dentist. I could not imagine anything better in life. I found myself suddenly in an entirely new world. I was part of the glories of the past; and I resolved to be one of the glories of the future.’ [Confessions. P. 107]
From the clerk of Trinity College, Cambridge, Jean Overton Fuller received correspondence stating that ‘according to my records, Edward Aleister Crowley matriculated in 1895. He passed the second part of the General Examination in the Michaelmas Term 1896, the first part in Easter Term 1897 and took the Special Examination in Chemistry in the Michaelmas Term, 1897, obtaining a second class. He did not graduate. He was in residence from the Michaelmas Term 1895 until the Easter Term 1898’. [The Magical Dilemma of Victor Neuburg. Jean Overton Fuller. 1965. P. 130]
On Tuesday 12th October 1897 Crowley was twenty-two years old and he developed a minor illness during that October and having thoughts on his own mortality found it difficult to perceive of a career or a future in which his genius and remarkable talents would be remembered and so a darkness within his soul was born.
‘I had been satisfied to escape from religion to the world. I now found that there was no satisfaction here. I was not content to be annihilated. Spiritual facts were the only thing worth while. Brain and body were valueless except as the instruments of the soul’. [Confessions. P. 124-5]
Crowley was experiencing a great spiritual awakening as he underwent what he called the ‘vision of the universal sorrow’, in which he recognised sorrow to be the greater factor in existence, very much in the Buddhist view of the acceptance of sorrow. This melancholy and sorrowful mood following his ‘trance of sorrow’ would continue for the rest of the year as he struggled with his own emotions and convictions as to his belief in God.
On Tuesday 7th December 1897 we find the young poet visiting the home of his friend the Cambridge lecturer and engineer Professor C. G. Lamb [3], where something quite extraordinary took place. He writes about it in his preface to ‘Aceldama’ – ‘It was a windy night, that memorable seventh night of December, when this philosophy was born in me. How the grave old Professor wondered at my ravings! I had called at his house, for he was a valued friend of mine, and I felt strange thoughts and emotions shake within me. Ah! how I raved! I called to him to trample me, he would not. We passed together into the stormy night. I was on horseback, how I galloped round him in my phrenzy, till he became the prey of a real physical fear! How I shrieked out I know not what strange words! And the poor good old man tried all he could to calm me; he thought I was mad! The fool! I was in the death struggle with self: God and Satan fought for my soul those three long hours. God conquered – now I have only one doubt left – which of the twain was God? Howbeit, I aspire!’ [Aceldama.1898. The Collected Works of Aleister Crowley. Vol I. 1905]
Crowley felt a strong friendship towards Professor Lamb and what the nature of the friendship was we do not know but he regarded him highly enough to dedicate his ‘Two Sonnets’ from ‘Mysteries: Lyrical and Dramatic’ to him.
The spiritual void created by his ‘trance of sorrow’ would be filled by his studies in the occult which began to fascinate him at this period when he started to read A. E. Waite’s [1857-1942] ‘Book of Black Magic and of Pacts’ [1898].
As for Pollitt Crowley says ‘I saw him only once or twice that term, but corresponded with him from abroad during the Christmas vacation. The result was the establishment of the first intimate friendship of my life’. [Confessions. P.142]
During the Christmas vacation of 1897, on Thursday 23rd December in Amsterdam Crowley was writing to Pollitt and their relationship began to take on a new dimension. He also had another crisis of faith; he had walked alone all day through the streets of Amsterdam, and upon reaching the docks he watched the ships and held his little ‘silver Christ’ on a crucifix and contemplated his future and his spiritual inclinations; the Plymouth Brethren had so influenced and shaped his early life that there must have been moments of guilt and perhaps feelings of failure as he looked up to his father whom he admired greatly up until his death on Saturday 5th March 1887.
Let me pass out beyond the city gate.
All day I loitered in the little streets
Of black worn houses tottering, like the fate
That hangs above my head even now, and meets
Prayer and defiance as not hearing it.
They lean, these old black streets! a little sky
Peeps through the gap, the rough stone path is lit
Just for a little by the sun, and I
Watch his red face pass over, fade away
To other streets, and other passengers,
See him take pleasure where the heathen pray,
See him relieve the hunter of his furs,
All the wide world awaiting him, all folk
Glad at his coming, only I must weep:
Rise he or sink, my weary eyes invoke
Only the respite of a little sleep;
Sleep, just a little space of sleep, to rest
The fevered head and cool the aching eyes;
Sleep for a space, to fall upon the breast
Of the dear God, that He may sympathise.
Long has the day drawn out; a bitter frost
Sparkles along the streets; the shipping heaves
With the slow murmur of the sea, half lost
In the last rustle of forgotten leaves.
Over the bridges pass the throngs; the sound,
Deep and insistent, penetrates the mist –
I hear it not, I contemplate the wound
Stabbed in the flanks of my dear silver Christ.
He hangs in anguish there; the crown of thorns
Pierces that palest brow; the nails drip blood
There is the wound; no Mary by Him mourns,
There is no John beside the cruel wood;
I am alone to kiss the silver lips;
I rend my clothing for the temple veil;
My heart’s black night must act the sun’s eclipse;
My groans must play the earthquake, till I quail
At my own dark imagining; and now
The wind is bitterer; the air breeds snow;
I put my Christ away; I turn my brow
Towards the south steadfastly; my feet must go
Some journey of despair. I dare not turn
To meet the sun; I will not follow him:
Better to pass where sand and sulphur burn,
And days are hazed with heat, and nights are dim
With some malarial poison. Better lie
Far and forgotten on some desert isle,
Where I may watch the silent ships go by,
And let them share my burden for a while.
Let me pass out beyond the city gate
Where I may wander by the water still,
And see the faint few stars immaculate
Watch their own beauty in its depth, and chill
Their own desire within its icy stream.
Let me move on with vacant eyes, as one
Lost in the labyrinth of some ill dream,
Move and move on, and never see the sun
Lap all the mist with orange and red gold,
Throw some lank windmill into iron shade,
And stir the chill canal with manifold
Rays of clear morning; never grow afraid
When he dips down beyond the far flat land,
Know never more the day and night apart,
Know not where frost has laid his iron hand
Save only that it fastens on my heart;
Save only that it grips with icy fire
These veins no fire of hell could satiate;
Save only that it quenches this desire.
Let me pass out beyond the city gate.
[The Goad. Amsterdam. 23rd December 1897. ‘Songs of the Spirit’]
Some days later, on New Year’s Eve [Friday 31st December 1897] Crowley had returned from Amsterdam and made arrangements to meet Pollitt in Birmingham and they would stay at the Queen’s Hotel. After dinner they retired to their rooms and talked from around 11-12 p.m. Crowley was tired, no doubt from travelling and went to bed and just before midnight, we find Crowley being admitted to the ‘permanent office of the Order of the Temple’ [The Equinox of the Gods. P. 111], in other words, Pollitt seduced him for the first time.
‘...my animal nature stood rebuked and kept silent in the presence of the immanent divinity of the Holy Ghost; omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent, yet blossoming in my soul as if the entire forces of the universe from all eternity were concentrated and made manifest in a single rose’. [Confessions. P. 124] From Crowley’s poetic language we can see that he looked upon the intimacy as a sort of spiritual awakening and that the ‘trance of sorrow’ was at an end. Crowley had found his silver Christ in the golden-haired, sad eyed face of Herbert Charles Jerome Pollitt:
‘Then came the great awakening. Curious to say, it was toward the hour of midnight on the last day of the year when the old slinks away from the new, that he happened to be riding alone, wrapped in the dark cloak of unutterable thoughts. A distant bell chimed the last quarter of the dying year, and the snow which lay fine and crisp on the roadway was being caught up here and there by the puffs of sharp frosty wind that came snake-like through the hedges and the trees, whirling it on spectre-like in the chill and silver moonlight. But dark were his thoughts, for the world had failed him. Freedom had he sought, but not the freedom that he had gained. Blood seemed to ooze from his eyelids and trickle down, drop by drop, upon the white snow, writing on its pure surface the name of Christ. Great bats flitted by him, and vultures whose bald heads were clotted with rotten blood. ‘’Ah! the world, the world... the failure of the world’’. And then an amber light surged round him, the fearful tapestry of torturing thought was rent asunder, the voices of many angels sang to him. ‘’Master! Master!’’ he cried, ‘’I have found Thee... O silver Christ...’’
Then all was Nothingness... nothing... nothing... nothing; and madly his horse carried him into the night.
Thus he set out on his mystic quest towards that goal which he had seen, and which seemed so near, and yet, as we shall learn, proved to be so far away’. [The Temple of Solomon the king. J.F.C.Fuller. 1909. The Equinox. Vol I. No 2]
It was almost one year previous to this important event that Crowley had his ‘Stockholm Revelation’ at approximately midnight on New Year’s Eve [Thursday 31st December] 1896 in which he ‘was admitted to the Military Order of the Temple’ [The Equinox of the Gods. P.111] and was ‘awakened to the knowledge that I possessed a magical means of becoming conscious of and satisfying a part of my nature which had up to that moment concealed itself from me. It was an experience of horror and pain, combined with a certain ghostly terror, yet at the same time it was the key to the purest and holiest spiritual ecstasy that exists’. [Confessions. P.124]
From this rather ambiguous passage we can gather that Crowley became aware of certain feelings within himself and that an encounter made him fully conscious of his bisexual character and his dual masculine and feminine nature. In fact, Crowley states in his often overlooked masterpiece ‘Not the life and adventures of Sir Roger Bloxam. A Novellisim’, [1916-1917] that he was skating in Sweden and knowing no-one there except the British minister and his wife, he soon began to tire of skating when he had a fall and was assisted to his feet by a Scotsman whom he names as James L. Dickson in the novellisim; this may or may not be his actual name, either way, they became acquainted and talked and ‘that night [Tuesday 29th December 1896] he dined with Sir Roger [Crowley]; the next night [Wednesday 30th December] Sir Roger dined with him; on New Year’s Eve [Thursday 31st December] he dined with Sir Roger again, and almost on the very stroke of the bell of St. Somebody’s Cathedral that rang the Old Year out – I don’t remember my Swedish Saints – he obtained the desired introduction to Porphyria Poppoea [Crowley’s anus, - from Chapter twenty-one, Roger Bloxam.] I believe the Scottish ‘gentleman’ may have had sadistic tendencies for in the opening of the next chapter we read: ‘Porphyria Poppoea was perhaps a trifle sore at the rudeness of the Scotsman’. This may have awakened Crowley’s leanings towards masochism.
We also find in Crowley’s ‘White Stains’ of 1898 a curious little poem simply titled:
To J.L.D.
At last, so long desired, so long delayed,
The step is taken, and the threshold past;
I am within the palace I have prayed
At last.
Like scudding winds, when skies are overcast,
Came the soft breath of Love, that might not fade.
O Love, whose magic whispers bind me fast,
O Love, who hast the kiss of Love betrayed,
Hide my poor blush beneath thy pinions vast,
Since thou hast come, nor left me more a maid,
At last.
The encounter with James L Dickson [J.L.D.] is obviously an important event both sexually and spiritually in Crowley’s life.
We also read that a few nights later Sir Roger encounters a Swedish soldier whom he calls ‘Count Svendstrom’. The soldier picks Crowley up and at 11 p.m. seduces the young Crowley. On the following day we are told that he meets a number of other soldier officers and after lunch indulges in sexual exploits, taking on the ‘Household Cavalry’. I don’t think this is too far from the truth! [Roger Bloxam. Chapter twenty-two]
What time for language, when our kisses flow
Eloquent, warm, as words are cold and weak?-
Or now – Ah! sweetheart , even were it so
We could not speak!
[At Stockholm. White Stains. 1898]
On his return journey he stops off at Copenhagen in January of 1897 and there writes the poem ‘Astray in her paths’.
It’s strange but Crowley’s description of Pollitt appears rather cold and detached, writing in his Confessions that he was ‘rather plain than otherwise. His face was made tragic by the terrible hunger of the eyes and the bitter sadness of the mouth. He possessed one physical beauty – his hair. This was very plentiful and he wore it rather long. It was what is called a shock. But its colour was pale gold, like spring sunshine, and its texture of the finest gossamer. The relation between us was that ideal intimacy which the Greeks considered the greatest glory of manhood and the most precious prize of life’. [p.142] from reading this we are in no doubt as to the nature of the relationship for Crowley made it quite clear: ‘I lived with Pollitt as his wife for some six months and he made a poet out of me’. [Perdurabo by Richard Kaczynski. P.40] Crowley preferred the passive, feminine role during sexual intimacy. This can be seen in the Paris Working of 1914/15 with his magical assistant Victor Neuburg and he also admired the beautiful, strong woman who could dominate him sexually as he was somewhat drawn to masochistic tendencies.
Pollitt mixed in decadent, artistic circles and introduced Crowley to the works of Whistler and Beardsley. Crowley was probably being polite for the sake of his friendship with Pollitt, taking an interest in his passions and activities. Crowley had other things on his mind, such as his spiritual growth and his enquiring scientific mind would not stand still, and it would be these differences between them that would terminate the relationship.
‘My feelings for him [Pollitt] was an intensely pure flame of admiration mingled with infinite pity for his spiritual disenchantment. It was infinite because it could not even imagine a goal and dwelt wholly amid eternal things’. [Confessions. P.143]
‘To him I was a mind – no more. He never manifested the slightest interest in any of my occupations. He had no sympathy with any of my ambitions, not even my poetry, except in a very peculiar way, which I have never thoroughly understood. He showed an instinctive distrust of my religious aspirations, because he realized that sooner or later they would take me out of his reach. He had himself no hope or fear of anything beyond the material world. But he never tired of the originality of my point of view; of watching the way in which my brain dealt with every subject that came under discussion’. [Confessions. P.143]
It is plain to see that Crowley craved recognition for his achievements, especially from someone he loved and admired, but their paths were taking different courses and it is understandable that Crowley could not be content and contained by mere love alone, he was too immense a mind to subject himself to that sacrifice of the soul, no matter how strong that love, in the end it would be destructive. ‘My friendship with Pollitt in no way interfered with the current of my life. I went on reading, writing, climbing, skating, cycling and intriguing, as if I had never met him’. [Confessions. P.143]
By January 1898 Crowley was moving into new rooms at 14 Trinity Street, Cambridge and Pollitt would often be ‘at home with the poet’. John Symonds gives us a description of Crowley and his elegant rooms at Trinity: ‘he had taken to wearing pure silk shirts and great floppy bow-knotted ties; on his fingers were rings of semi-precious stones. An atmosphere of luxury, studiousness and harsh effort pervaded his rooms at Cambridge. Books covered the walls to the ceiling and filled four revolving walnut bookcases. They were largely on science and philosophy, with a modest collection of Greek and Latin classics, and a sprinkling of French and Russian novels. On one shelf shone the black and gold of The Arabian Nights of Richard Burton; below was the flat canvas and square label of the Kelmscott Chaucer. Valuable first editions of the British poets stood beside extravagantly bound volumes issued by Isidor Liseux. Over the door hung an ice-axe with worn-down spike and ragged shaft, and in the corner was a canvas bag containing a salmon rod. Leaded Staunton chessmen were in their mahogany box upon a card-table scattered with poker chips.’[Confessions. P.15]. We must not forget that Crowley came into his inheritance (of which he was really not prepared for) upon reaching the age of twenty-one [Monday 12th October 1896] and figures often quoted are forty to fifty thousand pounds which was a huge amount at the time, and it may even have been a larger figure than this!
Crowley yet again tells us of Pollitt, that ‘He was in residence during the Easter term of 1898 and we saw each other almost every day. In the vacation he accompanied me to Wastdale Head and used to walk with me over the fells, though I could never persuade him to do any rock climbing’. [Confessions. P. 148]
Crowley was a natural climber and in the summer vacations of 1896 and 1897 he was climbing in the Alps, (also the summer of 1895 before his matriculation to Trinity College in October was spent climbing in the Alps). [4]
At Wasdale Crowley was reading Karl Von Eckartshousen’s [1752-1813] ‘The Cloud Upon the Sanctuary’ [1896] and the distance between Pollitt and Crowley was widening. [5]
When Crowley went down from Cambridge in the summer of 1898 after choosing not to take his degree, he decided to go to The Bear Hotel in Maidenhead where he would work on his poem ‘Jezebel’. But somehow Pollitt found out where he was staying and went after him. Crowley was not pleased by the interruption and so it would have been inevitable that Pollitt caused a scene. [6] It was here that Crowley ended the friendship with Pollitt, saying ‘I told him frankly and firmly that I had given my life to religion and that he did not fit into the scheme’. [Confessions. P.149] Crowley here is sacrificing the greatest love of his life for spiritual fulfilment, a noble act and a selfish act –
‘It has been my lifelong regret, for a nobler and purer comradeship never existed on this earth’. [Confessions. P. 149]
Crowley records some of the events of his time with Pollitt in his ‘Roger Bloxam’: ‘Pray, think not so ill of my Porphyria Poppoea; for in all her loves she had one love, and that for all her life. He was a man with golden hair [Pollitt] so fine and pale, yet, glowing, that one thought of sun-rays incarnate in gossamer; and his face was like the harvest moon. He came up to his University every year; and there he met Sir Roger Bloxam [Crowley] at a club called the Knights of the Round Table. I must not tell his name: besides, would it sound sweet in your ears also? When he divined the presence of Porphyria Poppoea, he fell instant in love with her, and dared not speak, because he feared to offend Sir Roger Bloxam! ‘Twas in a week of revelry, and this man played and danced for a dramatic club. Will god not give me a name for him? Some name of angel strength and sweetness? Surely Porphyria yearned for him as Phoedra for Hippolytus – Let that, then, serve! Well, the week parted and we did not see Sir Roger again. But when he left, he left a book, the ‘Legendes des Sexes of Edouard d’ Haraucourt’, the Sieur de Chamblay [7], and in it he wrote five words. These words mean nothing: a chess-player might have used them in the beginning to enumerate his pieces; but when Sir Roger Bloxam read them, Porphyria Poppoea divined that Hippolytus [Pollitt] loved her. She was a nymph of excellent modesty, and impudence unmatched – o paradox sublime of God’s invention! She lusted nobly for all love, and gave herself utterly and shamelessly; yet, despite herself, she acted in true Panic fear at the approach of her God. Thus, urgently desiring Sir Roger to take her to the Lake where Hippolytus had his palace, she forced the good Knight to fly with her to Amsterdam; thence only she dictated letters so fiercely burning that her whole soul was lost in them. Safe, she became bold. Yet, by his letters, mocking and provoking, yet eager as hers, he drew her to him. Oh but she must turn to him Heliotrope! Thus she came back to England. And Sir Roger must perforce meet Hippolytus at the Queen Hotel in Birmingham.’’What a place for a romance! You jest!’’ oh love knows not of time and space – Always the time and place and the loved one all together! Sir Roger registered in the hotel book: at that moment Hippolytus walked in. ‘’Hullo, monkey tricks!’’ cried he; and Porphyria Poppoea’s soul went into shuddering blackness; for in his manner was no hint of all he had written. She was not loved! And after dinner he sat talking in his room with Sir Roger – endlessly! It was the last day of the Old Year – the last hour – Heaven and Hell in her heart. Sir Roger went to bed early, thank the Gods. And she – she could not sleep. But ere the midnight car of Helius crossed the nadir Hippolytus had come into the room where she was, and possessed her’. [Not the life and adventures of Sir Roger Bloxam. Chapter twenty-nine. P. 30-31]
Also during that summer of 1898 Crowley went climbing in Zermat, Switzerland and he met Oscar Eckenstein [1859-1921] the rock climber and mountaineer who was to be a great influence upon Crowley [8] Also during this vacation he met the chemist Julian l. Baker and another chemist named George Cecil Jones [9] Crowley had a slight illness and on returning to London visited his Doctor and took a room at the Hotel Cecil where he wrote poetry and read some literature on the occult. He wrote the poem ‘Jephthah’ and most of the poems from that collection.
Crowley is also thinking of Pollitt in 1898 after his November initiation into the Golden Dawn [10], and he writes these two cruel sonnets: [11]
Sonnets (1)
To the author of the phrase: ‘I am not a
Gentleman and I have no friends’.
I
Self-damned, the leprous moisture of thy veins
Sickens the sunshine, and thine haggard eyes,
Bleared with their own corrupting infamies,
Glare through the charnel-house of earthly pains.
Horrible as already in hell. There reigns
The terror of the knowledge of the lies
That mock thee, thy death’s double destinies
Clutch at the throat that sobs, and chokes, and strains.
Self-damned on earth, live out thy tortured days,
That men may look upon thy face, and see
How vile a thing of woman born may be.
Then, we are done with thee, go, go thy ways
To other hells, thou damned of God hereafter,
‘Mid men’s contempt and hate and pitiless laughter.
II
Lust, impotence, and knowledge of thy soul,
And that foreknowledge, fill the fiery lake
Of lava where thy lazar corpse shall break
The burning surface to seek out a goal
More horrible, unspeakable. The scroll
Opens, and coward, liar, monster shake
Those other names of goat and swine and snake
Where with hell’s worms caress thee and control.
Nay, but alone, intolerably alone,
Alone, as here, thy carrion soul shall swelter,
Yearning in vain for sleep, or death, or shelter;
No release possible, no respite known!
Self-damned, without a friend, thy eternal place
Sweats through the painting of thy harlot’s face.
At the hour of the eclipse,
Wednesday, Dec. 28.
1. The virulence of these sonnets is excusable when it is known that their aim was to destroy the influence in Cambridge of a man who headed in that University a movement parallel to that which at Oxford was associated with the name of Oscar Wilde. They had their effect.
The sonnets were included in the first volume of Crowley’s collected works and were probably written just after midnight on the occurrence of the total lunar eclipse which happened between Tuesday 27th and Wednesday 28th December 1898. The break-up between them which took place a few months previously is still very fresh on Crowley’s mind.
Even two years later, on New Year’s Eve [Sunday 31st December 1899] Crowley is still under the spell of Pollitt and between the hours of 10 and 11 p.m. he does a magical operation ‘to destroy the shell, i.e. to exorcise my Qliphoth [base emotions] about P_______ [Pollitt] and so either to cure or kill, as alive or dead respectively’. [From records kept between November 1898 and New Year’s Day 1899]
In Crowley’s ‘The Scented Garden of Abdullah the Satirist of Shiraz’ [Bagh-I-Muattar] of 1910 in the introductory essay by the Reverend P D Carey [Crowley] the poet cannot help but drift into a lament for the loss of his great love – Pollitt!
‘shall I find you, sweet acolyte of Salmacis or of
Terpsichore, of Bacchus or sabrina? Will it be you on
yonder bank of yellow moss by the sunspangled rivulet
that tumbles noisily from the throne of God? Will it be
you with your fine golden hair like spiders’ webs in the
sun, changed to an aureole, and your seductive face still
as ever the incarnation of one single never-ending scarlet
kiss? Will yours be the long pale hands to mould my
body to your liking; and yours the faithful, the unfailing
member that never said me nay?
Oh come to me there, darling! Lean upon the golden
Rampart, and watch for me to come! Be first to meet me,
Sweetheart! Forgive me for all the wrong I did you here.
I will try and be a good wife to you, darling, if you will
Give me one more chance to hold your love. I had heaven
In your kisses, and I went to seek it in the cloister.
I loved you always; it was but a boy’s folly; forgive me!
I may never cling to you on earth again: pray God that
Heaven may be one long, long life of such bliss as we
Had of one another long ago by yon slow stream on
Whose banks I have wandered (many a time since)
Crying like a lost soul concerning you in the words
Of Milton lamenting his beauteous-buttocked Lycidas
“Oh! Who hath reft my dearest pledge?” Alas! Neither
Fate nor God could I accuse: the dread hollow voice of
My own stricken soul answered me “Thine own folly,
Thou miserable of the fortunate of the sons of men!”
Ah! but I beat my breast – in vain – in vain!
Ay! The joy we had of each other under those
Blue-grey hills! Do you remember the day of the
Storm, when we huddled under the rocks, and lit a
Fire of bracken and pine twigs? How you stripped me
By force – for I was afraid, and jealous, and
Coquettish – and took your pleasure of me, thrice in
The one delirious hour? By the memory of that cave,
I conjure you, be first to meet me in the Elysian fields!’
[An essay by the reverend P.D.Carey (Crowley). The Scented Garden of Abdullah]
In a later poem called ‘The Riddle’ included in Crowley’s ‘The Scented Garden of Abdullah’ (the Bagh-i-Muattar) of 1910, Pollitt’s name is spelt out from the first letter of each line:
‘Habib hath heard; let all Iran
who spell aright from A to Z
Exalt thy fame and understand
with whom I made a marriage-bed;
Resort to tool-and-podex play
till all the world in tears is shed
Before the sword of Azrael,
the trump of Israfel the dread,
Exalt, exalt our love at last
among the living and the dead,
Resort to love, and press its purple
calix with His purple head,
Till fall the pearls with rubies strong,
the dews upon the dawn that bled.
Crimson, o lover, was our love,
and crimson streams the sunset past;
Hyacinthine glows the vault of night,
the Future certain, sure to last.
Accept the gold of noon that pours
its white-hot flood, its radiant blast!
Rampant within thy podex take
this member, stiffer than a mast.
Lively as love itself, supreme
in pride stupendous in the vast!
Even the present gold and white,
the moment ever fleeting fast,
Surrendered never! this delight
the Venus-throw hath surely cast.
Jehannum shall exclaim ‘Habib!’
and light inform its murky fire,
Entrancing all the ghouls to love,
waking the Shaitans to desire!
Rejoicing souls in Paradise
shall spurn the Hur al Ayn with ire,
Opening their lips in pangs of woe,
offering their souls in pawn to hire!
Men from the utmost desert lands
shall spur their steeds through sand and mire,
Even to look upon the face
immortal from this lewdly lyre.
Perfect, Habib, my magic song;
perfect our loves for ever are:
Olibanum and ambergris,
nargis and rose of the ‘attar,
Lily and lilac, thus they rise
in fragrance to the morning star.
Light springs and liberty is fair –
o break the intoxicating jar!
It is enough that thou art Near,
the shamer of the foolish Far
To glut thy jasmine podex on
the member of thine El Qahar;
To glut thine almond member in
the podex of thine El Qahar.’
And in the following poem XLII ‘Bagh-I-Muattar’ Crowley does the same with his own name spelt out at the beginning of each line, but from bottom to top.
We tend to view Crowley like some colossus, confident with an air of mystery surrounding him, but we must remember that Crowley was in his early twenties when he first met Pollitt, and he had not yet made a name for himself in the world and was fresh from the stifled atmosphere of the Plymouth Brethren. He was a young man, naive in many ways but a man of strong passions and deep intellect. He excelled at chess, poetry and mountaineering but found it difficult to apply himself whole-heartedly to a subject, until of course he discovered the occult. In later life he was a man who raged against the church and authority and conducted his own way through life in accordance to his will, but as a young man he was prone to solitude in some romantic sense of isolation with a deep admiration for Shelley
Of man’s delight and man’s desire
In one thing is now weariness –
To feel the fury of the fire,
And writhe within the close caress
Of fierce embrace, and wanton kiss,
And final nuptial done aright,
How sweet a passion, shame, is this,
A strong man’s love is my delight!
[White Stains. 1898]
The late eighteen-nineties are a fascinating period in Crowley’s life and a time of much spiritual growth, yet the one true light in his life at the time was Jerome, of whom he admired with such passion and tenderness that he called their intimacy a ‘marriage’. The loss of this light in his life can be seen as a major factor in all his future relationships, for he was always searching for a man like Pollitt – ‘shortly after his arrival in New York, Crowley recorded in his diary his hope of attracting to himself a man like Jerome Pollitt, the love of his Cambridge youth.’ [Do What Thou Wilt: a life of Aleister Crowley. Laurence Sutin. 2000. P. 245]. Sadly, Crowley would never again find such a being as Herbert Charles Jerome Pollitt!
Notes:
1. Crowley’s address at this time [1895-1897] was 16 St John’s Street, Cambridge. Crowley also lived or spent time at the following addresses:
1875. 30 Clarendon Square, Leamington, Warwickshire.
11th June 1881. The Crowley family move to The Grange, Redhill, Surrey.
1883. White Rock School (also known as 'Habershon's Prep School'), 10 Pevensey Road,
St Leonards on Sea.
1885. Ebor School, 51 Bateman Street, Cambridge.
1886. The Crowley family move to Glenburnie House, 27 Hill Lane, Southampton.
1887. Thistle Grove (now Drayton Gardens), Brompton, London.
1889 (approximately). Polworth Road, London, SW16.
1891-92. (Middle Term). Crowley attends Malvern College, Worcester for three terms.
Summer 1892. Sligachan Inn, Skye.
1892. Crowley attends Tonbridge School, Kent, for Lent, Summer and Christmas terms.
Jan-July 1894. Crowley attends Eastbourne College, East Sussex.
Oct 1895. 16 St John's Street, Cambridge, as an undergraduate.
31st December 1897. Queen’s Hotel, Birmingham, Warwickshire.
1897-98. 35 Sidney Street, Cambridge.
Jan 1898. 14 Trinity Street, Cambridge.
May 1898. 37 Trinity Street, Cambridge.
1898. The Bear Hotel, Maidenhead, Berkshire.
1898. Hotel Cecil, The Strand, Piccadilly.
18th November 1898. 6 p.m. Initiated into the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn as a Neophyte at the Isis-Urania Temple, Mark Mason's Hall, Great Queen's Street, London.
Late 1898. 67 & 69 Chancery Lane, London.
Nov 1899. Boleskine House, Inverness, Scotland.
July 1900. Rented part of a house in Mexico overlooking the Alameda.
1900. Hotel Iturbide, Mexico.
22nd February 1901. Hotel Cosmopolita, Guadalajara, Mexico.
22nd February 1901. Hotel Cosmopolita, Guadalajara, Mexico.
8th March 1902. Hotel de Paris, Benares.
14th March 1904. Rented a ground floor flat of a corner house in Cairo near the Boulak Museum.
17th Sept & 9th Oct 1906. Ashdown Park Hotel, Coulsdon, Surrey.
1907. 21 Warwick Road, Earls Court, London.
24th March 1907. 60 Jermyn Street, Piccadilly, London.
3rd July 1907. Hotel Bristol, Gibraltar.
6th July 1907. Hotel Continental, Tangier.
12th Sept 1907. Hotel Sandwich, Guilford.
Jan 1908. Hotel de Blois, 50 Rue Vavin, Paris, France.
20th Nov 1909. Hotel de L'Oasis, Tablat, Algeria.
21st Nov 1909. Hotel Roussea, Bir-Rabalou (now Bir-Ghabalou) Algeria.
22nd Nov 1909. Hotel Grossat, Aumale (now Sour El Ghozlane) Algeria.
24th Nov 1909. Hotel des Messageries, Sidi-Aissa, Algeria.
1910. 124 Victoria Street, London.
May 1910. Rempstone Manor, Dorset, the home of Commander Guy Marston where Crowley performed the Evocation of Bartzabel, the spirit of Mars, on 9th May.
Summer 1911. Hotel de Blois, 50 Rue Vavin, Paris, France.
21st Nov 1911. National Hotel, Zurich, Switzerland.
1911. Palace Hotel, St Moritz, Switzerland.
1911. Vanne Rouge Inn, Montigny, on the bank of the Loing, France.
1912. 33 Avenue Studios, Fulham, London.
Dec 1914. 40, West 36th Street, New York, U.S.A.
23rd June 1916. Four months spent at the home of Evangeline Adams - The Adams Cottage, lake Pasquaney, near Bristol, New Hampshire, U.S.A.
1917. 110 Street, Central Park West, Manhattan, New York, U.S.A.
Oct 1917. Studio on West 9th Street, New York, U.S.A.
1918. 1 University Place, Washington, U.S.A.
Summer 1918. Camp on Esopus Island in the Hudson River, U.S.A.
1918. 63 Washington Square South, New York, U.S.A. [6 months]
Nov 1919. 57 Grand River Avenue, West Detroit, Michigan, U.S.A.
Dec 1919. At the home of his aunt at 505 Eton Lodge, Outram Road, Croydon. [until Jan 1920]
2nd April 1920. At the Abbey of Thelema, Cefalu, until his expulsion in April 1922.
Feb 1922. Au Cadran Bleu (Inn), Fontainebleu, France.
1922. 31 Wellington Street, Chelsea, London.
11th May 1923. Hotel Eymon, Tunis.
May 1923. Au Souffle du Zephir Hotel, Marsa, Tunisia.
25th July 1923. Tunisia Palace Hotel, Tunisia.
Autumn 1923. Hotel du Djerid, Nefta, Tunisia.
May 1924. Au Cadran Bleu (Inn), Chelles-Sur-Marne, Paris, France.
1926-27. 55 Avenue de Suffren, Paris, France.
June-1st Aug 1930. 89 Park Mansions, Knightsbridge, London.
July 1932. 27 Albermarle Street, Mayfair, London.
26th Sept 1932. 20 Leicester Square, London.
July 1933. 40 Cumberland Terrace, London.
1936-37. Room 6, 56 Welbeck Street, London.
17th July 1937. Crowley stays at the home of Edward Noel FitzGerald at Camber Sands.
Aug 1937. 59 Great Ormond Street, London.
June 1938. 6 Hasker Street, London. [until Feb 1939]
1939. 20 Jermyn Street, Piccadilly, London.
1939. 24 Chester Terrace, London.
Sept 1939. 57 Petersham Road, Richmond, Surrey.
1940. The Gardens, Middle Warberry Road, Torquay.
12th Jan 1941. Grand Hotel, Torquay.
March 1941. Barton Brow, Great Hill Road, Torquay.
May 1941. 41 Isaacs Road, Barton, Torquay.
June 1941. Thames Hotel, Maidenhead, Berkshire.
21st Oct 1941. 10 Hanover Square, London.
1941-42. 14 Lassell Gardens, Maidenhead, Berkshire.
7th May 1942. 140 Hamilton House, Piccadilly, London.
1943. 93 Jermyn Street, Piccadilly, London.
April 1944. The Bell Inn, Aston Clinton, Buckinghamshire. [until Jan 1945]
Jan 1945. Room 13, Netherwood, The Ridge, Hastings, where he died on 1st Dec 1947.
2. Herbert Charles Pollitt was christened on Wednesday 23rd August 1871 at Saint George’s Church, Kendal, Westmorland.
3. Dr Charles George Lamb M. A. , BSc, A.M.I.E.E., of Clare College, Cambridge, born 1867, died 4th May 1941. Lamb was emeritus reader in electrical engineering in the University of Cambridge. He originally wanted to be a professional musician but the early death of his father made this impracticable. He studied at the University of London, attending courses in zoology but decided to study electrical engineering at the City and Guilds College, where as a student he helped test the first alternating current transformer in Great Britain. After his graduation (and an M.A. degree in physics) he went to Cambridge in 1891 to assist Sir Alfred Ewing in his researches on the magnetic properties of iron. That same year he was appointed University demonstrator in mechanism and applied mechanics, a post he held until he was appointed University Lecturer in electrical engineering in 1903, [from his obituary in ‘Nature’ 147, p702-703. June 7th 1941]. His books include: ‘Examples in Applied Electricity’ 1912; ‘Alternating Currents – a text book for students of engineering’. 1906; ‘Notes on Magnetism for the use of students of electrical engineering’ 1932. Lamb possibly had some interest in the paranormal because in January 1926 he took part in a seance at the Headquarters of the British Society for Psychical Research (BSPR) with the medium Willy Schneider. The seance was organised by the researcher Dr E. J. Dingwall (1890-1986) and in attendance along with Lamb was a professional magician named Douglas Dexter. The results of the seance are that some supernatural effects did indeed occur. So it is possible that on the night of 7th December 1897 Crowley and Lamb were discussing ‘occult’ matters and ideas on the nature of electricity to which Crowley would have become very animated and possibly even made some magical/mental experiment which caused some sort of trance state.
4. During his 1895 vacation in Switzerland Crowley climbed the Eiger, the Jungfraugoch, Monch, Jungfrau, Wetterlucke, Monchjoch, Beichgrat, Petersgrat and the Tschingelhorn.
5. Crowley stayed at the Wastwater Hotel (now The Wasdale Head Inn) from 14th March - 18th April 1898.
6. After they parted Crowley wrote Pollitt a letter of apology but he did not send it. They spoke on a few occasions until one day Pollitt saw Crowley walking down Bond Street, London. Crowley did not acknowledge Pollitt and swore he did not see him but they would never speak again.
7. Edmond Haroucourt [1856-1941]. French poet, novelist and composer who wrote ‘The Legend of the Sexes – hysterical and profane poems’ published 1882 under the pseudonym ‘Sir Chamblay’.
8. Eckenstein was the leader of the first 1902 attempt to climb K2 by the Northeast Ridge. Aleister Crowley was also a member of the expedition (see The Confessions for an account of the expedition).
9. Julian Levett Baker born Camberwell 1873, died 1958 aged 84, Maidenhead. Baker became a member [neophyte] of the Golden Dawn in 1894 taking the magical motto Frater D.A. he progressed to be an Adeptus Minor on 10th March 1896. George Cecil Jones born Croydon 1873, died 1953 (or 1960). Jones became a member [neophyte] of the Golden Dawn on 12th July 1895 taking the magical motto ‘Volo Noscere’ and he became an Adeptus Minor on 11th January 1897. Both men were an early influence on Crowley’s magical training, especially astral visions, and Jones introduced Crowley to the Golden Dawn.
10. Friday 18th November 1898 (6 p.m.). Crowley became a Neophyte [0=0]at the Isis-Urania Temple, Mark Mason’s Hall, Great Queen’s Street, London, in the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, taking the magical name ‘Perdurabo’ (I will endure unto the end). Crowley’s other grades are as follows: December 1898 Zelator [1=10], January 1899 Theoricus [2=9], February 1899 Practicus [3=8], May 1899 in Paris (where he met Mathers for the first time) Philosophus [4=7]; on Monday 15th January 1900 in Paris Crowley was admitted to the second order of the Golden Dawn and on the next day (Tuesday 16th January) he became an Adeptus Minor [5=6] a ‘Lord of the paths in the Portal of the Vault of the Adepts’ taking the magical motto ‘Christeos Luciftias’. After receiving Liber Al vel Legis (the Book of the Law) in Cairo on April 8th, 9th and 10th 1904 Crowley claimed the grade ofAdeptus Major [6=5] taking the motto ‘Ol Sonuf Vaoresagi’ (from the first call or key of the Enochian, meaning ‘I reign over ye’. In 1909 he became an Adeptus Exemptus [7=4], his motto ‘OU MH’; on Friday 3rd December 1909 Magister Templi [8=3], his motto V.V.V.V.V. (Vi Veri Vniversum Vivus Vici – ‘By the force of truth, I, while living, have cinquered the universe’). 12th October (Crowley’s 40th birthday) 1915 Magus [9=2] taking the motto ‘To Mega Therion’ (The Great Beast) and in April/May 1921 aged 45, he became the Ipsissimus [10=1] at the Abbey of Thelema, Cefalu, Sicily.
11. 1898 was also the year Crowley self-published his first major poem ‘Aceldama – a place to bury strangers in’. The ‘philosophical’ poem consists of 32 stanzas and appeared during the last term at Trinity [only 88 copies were printed]. The poem was quickly followed by other publications in 1898: ‘The Tale of Archais’, ‘Songs of the Spirit’, ‘The Poem’, ‘Mysteries: Lyrical and Dramatic’, and ‘Jephthah and Other Mysteries’; these last two were shown to the poet W. B. Yeats in the spring of 1899.
THE BIRTH OF PAN
This earth calamity;
This new-born man:
Short on form, long on reason...
At the coming of the Golden Dawn
Wood whisperings reveal: Great Pan is born!
Born into a world absorbed by war
Where darkness is thy maiden whore!
And at the fount of our man-god, take
This treacherous rot of globe and make
A Kingdom, wonderful with gold
And goat-god lust both brave and bold:
Awake! Masturbating man of old!
This root of life;
This earthward bowel:
This token charmed from midnight foul!
Here, vomit up your history
To see the scum of Sodom pouring forth,
From the night to light this mystery;
Where loathsome is the flesh within
The sanctity of salvation's throne,
To reveal a great god, shook from dust;
His thighs thick with honey lust:
Mad, for the passion-bashed clitoris of fire
Where his seed shall flow and never tire
In the endless gash of mortal desire!
Barry Van-Asten
THE CALL OF CHORONZON
illustration: B.Van-Asten
Frater Omnia Vincam (Victor Neuburg) and the Adeptus Exemptus
OU MH (Aleister Crowley) at Bou-Saada, Algeria, 1909 e.v.
On Reading Victor Neuburg’s ‘Larkspur’
An apology, my friend
For gloom’d and grim, I finde
I am heartily inclin’d –
Yea! induced by God, with love
And deepe respect: I disapprove;
In fact, I find, I quite despise
Lyrics that could not higher rise,
Or reach the realms of Auroric Light!
Poet, I love thee, but thy dim verse is slight:
Dedication, prologue, epilogue, colophon –
Thy burden of ballads is fragile, spun!
Here, in the heart-space, I hath spied
Where thy stool of romance, awkward died;
Where substance crumbles, dry as stone;
Where garlands, gilded make thy throne!
Sweete muse, apace, forsaken thee:
Yellow moon – Bowpots – Trollie-Lollie!
Pan’s triumph sings the spirit – love was strong
When thy moonlit-magic ushered song
Raptures light upon thy brow... I fear
Thou art blinded; thy body pained ‘pon the bier
In sick lament I kiss thee, reclin’d –
Thy cold lips songless, death defin’d
The torture-passions of brain – no doubt
Thy flame ‘pon the sacred shrine is out!
Fell, the laurels, Keats once wore
With Virgil, awaits the eternal shore:
Larkwise soar poet! thy noble arte
Dies swift in song-groves of thy hearte!
LIBER XXV (1)
An apology, my friend
For gloom’d and grim, I finde
I am heartily inclin’d –
Yea! induced by God, with love
And deepe respect: I disapprove;
In fact, I find, I quite despise
Lyrics that could not higher rise,
Or reach the realms of Auroric Light!
Poet, I love thee, but thy dim verse is slight:
Dedication, prologue, epilogue, colophon –
Thy burden of ballads is fragile, spun!
Here, in the heart-space, I hath spied
Where thy stool of romance, awkward died;
Where substance crumbles, dry as stone;
Where garlands, gilded make thy throne!
Sweete muse, apace, forsaken thee:
Yellow moon – Bowpots – Trollie-Lollie!
Pan’s triumph sings the spirit – love was strong
When thy moonlit-magic ushered song
Raptures light upon thy brow... I fear
Thou art blinded; thy body pained ‘pon the bier
In sick lament I kiss thee, reclin’d –
Thy cold lips songless, death defin’d
The torture-passions of brain – no doubt
Thy flame ‘pon the sacred shrine is out!
Fell, the laurels, Keats once wore
With Virgil, awaits the eternal shore:
Larkwise soar poet! thy noble arte
Dies swift in song-groves of thy hearte!
Olivia Vane
LIBER XXV (1)
THE STAR RUBY
I
Facing East (2), in the centre, draw deep deep deep thy breath closing thy mouth with thy right forefinger prest against thy lower lip (3). Then dashing down the hand with a great sweep back and out, expelling forcibly thy breath, cry ΑΠΟ ΠΑΝΤΟΣ ΚΑΚΟΔΑΙΜΟΝΟΣ ["Depart from me all evil spirits"] (4).
II
The Cross Qabalistic
With the same forefinger touch thy forehead, and say ΣΟΙ ["To Thee"] (5), thy member, and say Ω ΦΑΛΛΕ ["O Phallus"] (6), thy right shoulder, and say ΙΣΧΥΡΟΣ ["the Power"] (7), thy left shoulder, and say ΕΥΧΑΡΙΣΤΟΣ ["Thanksgiving"] (8); then clasp thine hands, locking the fingers, and cry ΙΑΩ (9).
III
Advance to the East. Imagine (10) strongly a Pentagram, aright, in thy forehead. Drawing the hands to the eyes, fling it forth, making the sign of Horus and roar ΘΗΡΙΟΝ (11). Retire thine hand in the sign of Hoor-paar-Kraat. Go round to the North and repeat; but say NUIT (12). Go round to the West and repeat; but whisper BABALON (13). Go round to the South and repeat; but bellow HADIT (14).
IV
Completing the circle widdershins (15), retire to the centre and raise thy voice in the Paian, with these words ΙΩ ΠΑΝ (16), with the signs of N.O.X. (17)
V
Extend the arms in the form of a Tau and say low but clear:
ΠΡΟ ΜΟΥ ΙΥΓΓΕΣ (18)
ΟΠΙΣΩ ΜΟΥ ΤΕΛΕΤΑΡΧΑΙ (19)
ΕΠΙ ΔΕΞΙΑ ΣΥΝΟΧΕΙΣ (20)
ΕΠΑΡΙΣΤΕΡΑ ΔΑΙΜΟΝΕΣ (21)
ΦΛΕΓΕΙ ΓΑΡ ΠΕΡΙ ΜΟΥ Ο ΑΣΤΗΡ ΤΩΝ ΠΕΝΤΕ
ΚΑΙ ΕΝ ΤΗΙ ΣΤΗΛΗΙ
Ω ΑΣΤΗΡ ΤΩΝ ΕΞ ΕΣΤΗΚΕ.
VI
Repeat the Cross Qabalistic, as above, [II], and end as thou didst begin [I].
NOTES:
1. The Star Ruby is an official ritual of the A∴A∴ and it was first published by Crowley in a slightly different form in The Book of Lies [Liber CCCXXXIII], Chapter XXV in 1913 e.v. It was later published in a revised form in Magick in Theory and Practice in Appendix VI of Part III. XXV=25, 5 is the Pentagram and 25 is the square of 5. The Pentagram is red = Geburah, 5.
2. East is the direction towards Boleskine House in Scotland.
The circle with the traditional fixed astrological signs
The circle with the astrological signs in Thelemic Ritual workings
3. The sign of Hoor-par-Kraat (sign of silence).
4. Standing in the centre of the circle (Malkuth). APO PANTOS KAKODAIMONOS APO = 151, PANTOS = 701, KAKO = 111, DAIMONOS = 445, total = 1408. [1408 = 2x704 or 4x352 or 8x176 or 11x128 or 16x88 or 22x64 or 32x44].
5. The Qabalistic Cross. SOI = 280 [Forehead= Kether, on the Middle Pillar]. 280 is the name of Sandalphon, the Archangel of Malkuth. It establishes the idea of Kether in Malkuth and Malkuth in Kether. 280 is also Sigma-Pi in Greek, like Samekh-Peh in Hebrew, the intersection of the paths on the Tree of Life, before the Veil of Paroketh. Also consider: 280 = 2x140 or 4x70 or 5x56 or 7x40 or 8x35 or 14x20 or 10x28.
6. O PhALLE = 1366. Phallus: Malkuth although mostly represented by Yesod on the Middle Pillar. 1366 = 2x283 (Prime numbers). ΦΑΛΛΟς = 831 (3x277) also πυραμίς [Pyramid].
7. ISChUROS = 1580. The right shoulder is Geburah, (the sphere of Jupiter) on the Pillar of Severity. 1580 = 20x79, [79= the two pillars].
8. EUChARISTOS = 1886. The left shoulder is Chesed on the pillar of Mercy. 1886 = 2x23x41 [23 = ChIH (Life) and 41 = AM (Mother)]. Also 2x943.
9. IAO = 811 (Prime number). 8 = HADIT and 11 = NUIT. The Heart is Tiphereth. See the Formula of IAO in Magick in Theory and Practice, Chapter V.
10. East (Boleskine). The Pentagrams are ‘imagined’ rather than drawn from the appropriate points as in the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram, used in the Golden Dawn etc.
11. THERION (Greek for ‘Beast’) = 247. Chokmah – Chaos, the Logos, the Word. East. Hod. Taurus. Element: Earth. 247 = 19x13. [19 = Teth, the 19th path on the Tree of Life (Leo). Tarot: Strength (Lust) – Babalon and the Beast conjoined]. 19 is also ‘IT’ (spiritual semen) ΦΑΛΛΟς. I = the concealed Phallus and T = the extended Phallus. The Passive and the Active; Hoor-par-Kraat and Ra-Hoor-Khuit [Heru-Ra-Ha]. IT = 10+9 = 19 which is the Serpent – Leo/Fire. Strength. R.H.K. (Vishnu, Demeter, Venus) the lion, Sunflower, XI in the Tarot ‘Lust’. Letter ‘Teth’, ruled by the Sun (see The Book of Lies. A. Crowley). 13 = ACHAD, The Fool in the Tarot which is O. 13 = Love and Unity.
12. NUIT = 469. Element = Air. She is the infinite expansion. 469 = the Prime numbers 7x67, Binah. Aquarius. NUITh = 469.
13. BABALON = 156 (in Hebrew and Greek). Element = Water. 156 = 12x13. Netzach. Scorpio. West.
14. HADIT = 24. Element = Fire. He is the infinite contraction. Chokmah. Leo. HADITh = 315.
15. Widdershins (anti-clockwise) – not Deosil (clockwise) as in the LBRP.
16. IO PAN = Element = Spirit. The NOX Formula. It is spoken five times (in relation to the 5 signs of NOX). P is the letter of Mars and duality – the two pillars mercy and Severity. A is the Pentagram. N is the letter Nun which is Death in the Tarot.
17. N.O.X. = 210. NOX is Night – The Night of Pan, the withdrawing force which counter-balances L.V.X. (Light). The signs of NOX can also be given in the quarters as opposed to the East (Boleskine) see Reguli e.g. North: Puella, South: Puer, East: Vir, West: Mulier and East (Boleskine) once more: Mater Triumphans. The signs of NOX are described in Crowley’s ‘Magick in Theory and Practice’, Appendix VI: Liber V vel Reguli.
18. The Magician is standing at the crossing point of Samech-Peh upon the Tree of Life. PRO MOU YUNGES ["Before me the Iynges,"] OPISO MOU TELETARChAI ["Behind me the Teletarches,"] EPI DEXIA SUNOChEIS ["on my right hand the Synoches,"] EPARISTERA DAIMONES ["on my left hand the Daemones,"] PhLEGEI GAR PERI MOU O ASTΗR TON PENTE ["for about me flames the Star of Five,"] KAI EN TΗI STΗLΗI O ASTΗR TON EX ESTΗKE. ["and in the Pillar stands the Star of Six."] ΙΥΓΓΕΣ = 621. Chokmah (The Wheel of Fortune, the Swastica – whirling motion).
19. ΤΕΛΕΤΑΡΧΑΙ = 1352 = 8 (the cube of 2) x 169 (the square of 13). 8 = Mercury (initiation). 13 = Unity and Love, also it is a reflection of 31 (Al and La etc).
20. ΣΥΝΟΧΕΙΣ = 1525. (On the right = the Pillar of Mercy). South. Netzach. 25x61 or 5x5x61 [61 = AIN – No-Thing].
21. ΔΑΙΜΟΝΕΣ = 380. (On the left = the Pillar of Severity). North. Hod.
The magician facing towards east
P.A.A.A.
ODE TO SATAN
His bones are black like dragons’ teeth
And he’ll make merry with your soul.
Beyond concept, form and time, to dwell
In the regions of your own imagined Hell.
Like mind-fire, he rises,
Silk instigator, his bulk shall sway,
Song-like, in timeless rhythms, to emerge
Urgent at his supper of souls, again.
No purity too high; no weakness too low;
He is mistrust in the heart of every lover
And anger wrestling in the down-trodden.
A name swift to lips – he’ll come
In sleep or silence, seducing:
‘S’ words – serpent, scratch, sugar, sun;
Slumber, sweet, shout, sex, sing,
Smoke, scream, sinister, snake, sin...
Of them all, Satan, upon the tongue,
Licked with a rush of air...
Shushed and shaped into Sss-a-tan:
Satan, I call thee to me, Satan,
Sensual flame and saviour, strong:
Satan, Satan, Satan, come!
Barry Van-Asten
ALEISTER CROWLEY’S FAMILY TREE
BY AUDRAREP
Thomas Crowley 1713-1787 (Aleister's Great Great Grandfather) was a merchant living in London with his wife and seven children. He wrote many books and pamphlets on his Quaker faith. His son, Thomas Crowley 1753-1809 was a tanner and leather worker. He lived in London with his wife Elizabeth nee Driver and eight children who all belonged to the Quaker faith and Thomas became bankrupt in 1788. Three of Thomas's sons, Abraham 1795-1864, Charles Sedgefield 1798-1868 and Henry 1793-1857 married into the Curtis family of Alton in Hampshire. Abraham married Charlotte Curtis 1801-1892 in 1822; Charles Sedgefield married Emma Curtis 1804-1845 in 1838 (his second marriage, the first being to Marrion Morris), and Henry married Elizabeth Curtis 1806-1900 in 1845. The brothers founded a business partnership and bought the Turk Street Brewery in Alton on 28th August 1821. As the new brewery became established in Alton and Croydon, business flourished and so did the popularity of Crowley's Ales. The business was sold on 24th March 1877 to Harry Percy Burrell, whom Gertrude Crowley 1860-1925 would later marry in 1878. The business continued to trade as Crowley & Co until 1947.
Aleister Crowley married Rose in 1903. Rose was previously married to Major Frederick Thomas Skerrett, R.A.M.C. 1859-1899 at Camberwell on 31st August 1897. Following Aleister and Rose's divorce, Rose married the Roman Catholic Dr Joseph Andrew Gormley 1849-1925 at Kensington in October 1912. Rose Edith Gormley died in London in 1932. Lola Zaza Crowley was born in 1907 and she married Frank Hill in Paddington on Saturday 9th June 1934. They had a child named Elizabeth Hill born in Paddington in 1935. Lola Hill died on Friday 9th March 1990 at Battle Hospital, Reading, Berkshire. [correction note: Aleister Crowley's maternal grandmother Elizabeth Bishop nee Cole died 4th August 1896 in Wandsworth, not 1892 as stated and she was buried three days later on 7th August in Lambeth.]
Other children by Aleister include Anne Lea Crowley known as Poupee; mother's name Leah Hirsig. The child was born on Thursday 26th January 1920 at the Abbey of Thelema, Cefalu and died on 14th October 1920, Cefalu. Also Astarte Lulu Panthea Crowley born in Cefalu on 26th November 1920 to Ninette Shumway 1895-1989. Astarte Crowley died in 2005 in the United States and she had four children, one of which is the talented musician Eric Muhler who is happily still with us today. There was also a son born named Randal Gair known as Aleister Attaturk Crowley born in Newcastle-on-Tyne on 2nd May 1937 and dying at Chalfont St Peter, Buckinghamshire on 20th November 2002. The mother to Randal was Deidre Patricia MacAlpine (nee Doherty), born 1915.
I am that I am, the flame
Hidden in the sacred ark.
I am the unspoken name
I the unbegotten spark.
I am He that ever goeth,
Being in myself the Way;
Known, that yet no mortal knoweth,
Shewn, that yet no mortal sheweth,
I, the child of night and day.
I am never-dying youth.
I am Love, and I am Truth.
I am the creating Word,
I the author of the aeon;
None but I have ever heard
Echo in the empyrean
Plectron of the primal paean!
I am the eternal one
Winged and white, the flowering rod,
I the fountain of the sun,
Very God of very God!
I am he that lifteth up
Life, and flingeth it afar;
I have filled the crystal cup;
I have sealed the silver star.
I the wingless God that flieth
Through my firmamental fane,
I am he that daily dieth,
And is daily born again.
In the sea my father lieth,
Wept by waters, lost for ever
Where the waste of woe replieth:
“Naught and nowhere!” “Naught and never!”
I that serve as once he served,
I that shine as once he shone,
I must swerve as he has swerved,
I must go as he has gone.
He begat me; in my season
I must such a son beget,
Suffer too the triple treason,
Setting as my father set.
These my witnesses and women –
These shall dare the dark again,
Find the sacred ark to swim in
The remorseless realm of rain.
Flowers and fruits I bring to bless you,
Cakes of corn, and wealth of wine;
With my crown will I caress you,
With my music make you mine.
Though I perish, I preserve you;
Through my fall, ye rise above:
Ruling you, your priest, I serve you,
Being life and being love.
[‘The Ship A Mystery Play’ scene II, by Aleister Crowley,
from The Equinox volume I, number X. September 1913.]
THE WITTERING POST
THE MONOLOGUE OF LADY LO LO
By
Barry Van-Asten
A HIDDEN SECT
In the foothills of Tibet, in the Himalayan region known as the Zangbo Valley, there is a secluded monastery where devoted monks practice the art of a certain, obscure and unspoken branch of tantric sex. The monks, a splinter sect of Buddhists, worship the god of ‘One-Self’ and attempt to achieve the complete annihilation of the human element within the sacred acts of sex. The monks practice a series of ‘postures’ or ‘damilals’ and following the strict initiatory ceremony known as the ‘fujiku’, the devoted acolytes perfect their art in such care-free abandonment, invoking inner strength to achieve such sacred and distinguished ‘damilals’ such as the ‘Reversed Swan Feather’ in which the two participants are forbidden to touch any part of the others’ body, the only point of contact being the tips of the nose which must not disconnect and remains in ‘asanic’ beatitude with its ‘Sidak’ or ‘adored one’ for an indefinite period of time until it attains a spiritual release. Some of these damilals can go on for many years and for that matter the sidaks have constructed devices to enable the wearers to keep in contact through sleep for instance. The Reversed Swan Feather is therefore a ritual of restraint. In fact the monks are so dedicated in their pursuits and devotions that in a particular posture called the ‘Turned Mare’ the celebrants must have their arms broken in two places to perform the posture correctly and it would be nothing short of a great insult to attempt the posture minus the dislocated appendages!
In another extreme example, the position known as the ‘Flying Haiku’ calls for participants to have their limbs amputated! It is a fact that only a handful of monks have achieved this ‘rhakti’ or ‘sublimation of Self-ness’. In the posture known as the ‘Winged Avenger’ death is the inevitable outcome for its celebrants and it is affectionately called the ‘quiet release’ and the less said about the ‘Bereft Cobra’ the better, suffice to say that the ‘cheetulm’ or ‘admirer’ makes claims to the flesh of his ‘lover’ which he then consumes! It’s all quite gruesome really! (1)
THE ELIZABETH BATHORY OF BOYLAN SPRINGS
In many respects the monks seem to mirror my own tortured upbringing and spiritual development. I was brought-up in Ireland and as a young girl I attended the Boylan Springs School for Girls in County Wexford, a beautiful part of the country. The school was under the auspicious and sadistic leadership of Sister Monika, a monolith of Biblical proportions for we were Lilliputians under her tyrannical reign of terror! We called her Sister Dominatrix! I can remember as if it were only yesterday asking Sister O’Brien: ‘why do we have April showers and how does the sky know when it is April?’ to which she answered: ‘By the grace of God child, for all the little flowers are a want of water during the spring thirst and God hears their little prayers and sends forth mighty water clouds to quench this great thirst, but the water clouds are dark and not willing to relinquish their store of water, so God sends forth the beautiful Angels to dance with their little bare feet upon the clouds, like the bronzed peasants we hear of treading the grapes in the vineyards in those fortunate regions in France, Spain and Italy, except the Angels that tread the clouds are pure and wholesome for they are born of Ireland where God resides! (2) I asked her why God didn’t rain down potatoes in the great famine to feed the poor who prayed to him in their hunger, but she set me to ‘Hail Marys’ and ‘Our Fathers’ which didn’t really answer the question! I believe it wasn’t long after that that I stopped believing in a benevolent God as sure enough as I stopped believing in Father Christmas; for both lies had the same desired effect on me: behave yourself or you will not be rewarded! (3) One thought that was constantly in my mind at the time was that if this is how humanity treats its own kind then as far as I’m concerned they can all go perish in some damned abominable plague-type-thingy and nature can bloody well start again and get it right this time!
But if Sister Monika was unspeakably bad then Sister Bertha, ‘Beastly Bertha’ was a different kind of fish out of water! She always insisted on seeing the ‘colour of my soul’ whatever she meant by that. I think she must have been possessed of a Loudun Devil! (4) I would not say that she was sadistic but there was something not quite right about her. I remember she would creep into the dormitory every night and check the girls to make sure they were wearing the regular, rough as hell nightshirts which itched constantly and that we had not hidden silk undergarments beneath it which in her mind ‘issued forth salacious thoughts’ and made ‘Jesus weep!’ Silly old Bertha!
A CHOCOLATE JESUS
The school was such a cold and dismal place, a rambling pile of the Georgian period with numerous ghosts and legends attached to it. In fact, my friend Celia knew someone who knew someone who had been told by someone that they had seen an apparition of a woman descending the great stair. I didn’t see anything myself but I did hear the bell ring in the supposedly haunted tower and on other occasions I would hear footsteps following me along the top landing and when I looked round there was no-one there! That was strange. But stranger still is the idea of returning back to this world once we have turned over into the next! Why indeed after so much mortal toil would any ghost in its right mind want to walk amongst the living again, after all, isn’t the next step after life supposed to be a ‘heaven’, an eternal rest for some or a ‘hell’ and an eternal nightmare for others! Perhaps ghosts are those who fear to move on due to being judged of their earthly deeds and finding themselves in purgatory? But there are nice ghosts as well as horrid ghosts so that does not really figure as an explanation. I guess we will never really know until it is our turn to ‘open the garden gate’ and stride across the ‘Elysian Fields’. But yes, Boylan Springs, there was always the odd bang and tap in the middle of the night but nothing as frightening and hideous as Sister Monika rising in the night from her bed chamber like Nosferatu from his crypt, only fatter as if she had been feeding all night long and she was all white face-cream and blood-shot eyes with guilt-covered chocolate lips! She would say in almost sinister tones ‘don’t worry child! Father Callahan blesses the bars of chocolate along with the wine so it’s just like Holy Communion!’ (5)
DISTINCT DIMENSIONS
I believe it is very arrogant of the human race to presume it is the most intellectual of organisms upon the earth for we are but one link in an infinite spectrum of life-forms. Man looks down upon the monkey who in turn looks down upon the mouse; the mouse looks down upon the mollusc and the mollusc looks down upon the mite...and so on, but man is only a small fragment for our pitiful senses are very limited. What does an ant know of Canada? It can know nothing of it whatsoever because not only is it beyond its comprehension it is beyond its simple means of travel, unless it happens to live in Canada, in which case it would not know nor care! What does a small organism living at the bottom of the ocean know about rain or snow or trees? Nothing, and in this way man is also ignorant of many things which it cannot understand, explain or control; they even believe earth to be the only planet with life upon it! How absurd and how primitive! In the future we shall be humbled to the fact that not only does other life exist beyond our small galaxy, not life which simply crawls upon its stomach all day drinking, eating, fornicating and defecating, much like some examples of humanity, but a life capable of intelligent reasoning far beyond our own thought and a life capable of inter-stellar travel. To them it is us who are the underdeveloped monkeys or perhaps only the mice in our stage of evolution!
When I came to England I became drawn to the Wiccan craft and I felt an instant connection to its theories and practices and their belief system concerning nature and sex. It was all rather beautiful and natural and not stuffy and practiced in the darkness of inhibition under a clerical roof! God, you’d think they’d be more open about such a natural and ‘sacred’ act wouldn’t you? But then again humanity is a nest of shame!
ON HUMANITY
My friend Mona, you don’t know her, asked me recently what I thought of the human race, about its hypocrisy and its greed and its nasty ways when she suddenly burst upon me like a broken sewer pipe saying ‘you have no idea about the very worst of humanity, you cannot even conceive of how ugly mankind is!’ I was shocked, flabbergasted, now there’s a word I don’t often use! But the way she turned on me! ‘I beg your pardon!’ I said, ‘not seen the worst of humanity! Not seen its ugliness!’ so I told her straight ‘I’ll have you know’ I said ‘I’ve stood on the concourse at Euston Station in London on a Friday afternoon’ I said ‘with the great and the good and the unwashed waiting for the platform number for the London to Birmingham train! Not seen the worst!’ and I did I told her good and proper of how it’s ‘every man, woman and child for themselves! It’s alright’ I said ‘if you’re the public school, Oxbridge, rowing and rugby, boxing and sodomy type of chap, you know, tired suit heel-booting down to the platform, all elbows, knees, teeth and snot, then at the doors like a greyhound, inwardly snarling and snorting, huffing and puffing behind the newspaper and boom! Doors open! Children are unceremoniously thrown into the carriage to secure a seat and the ‘suits’ spread their awful weight in the seats, all armpits, bald heads and bad breath! There’s no room for the lame and the latecomers and damn those who fall by the wayside! Pregnant women and cripples haven’t got a chance’ I said.
‘We don’t use that out-dated word anymore’ she says ‘it’s not politically correct!’
‘Oh do excuse me!’ I said ‘perhaps I should say “expectant mothers to be”!’ I knew exactly what she meant but I am not one for pleasing the eyes and ears of society! I got so worked up about it that I had to go and have a sit down with a nice cup of tea, a cigarette and a few custard creams!
THE HALCYON DAYS OF THE LINCOLN BISCUIT
Sitting there enjoying my tea I suddenly thought ‘whatever happened to the good old Lincoln biscuit?’ I used to eat those things one dot at a time in a circular motion, I’m sure many people did and it took ages but the discipline involved has stood me in good stead! (6) No doubt the author will here insert some florid piece upon the romantic and tortured aspect of the famed Lincoln! (7)
THE LINCOLN BISCUIT
A Eulogy
Sweet concentric tormentor, friend;
Companion to the cup, ‘ere dream
Of tea-dunked bliss, that doth ascend
The shortcake crunch, devoid of cream!
McVities, hail! Ye disc of gold
Swore I allegiance, youth struck dumb
At dough-passions, serene, foretold
O circular monarch of biscuitdom!
To thee love stirs, your glory’s grace
Is more than bland accomplishment, see
The delicate crumb, grown far apace,
Superior shine over Malted Milk and Rich Tea!
Moribund, thy crown hath slipp’d askance;
Heartache – thou art poet’s bread!
Fare thee well Lincoln, thou didst entrance
And forge link ‘twixt living and the dead!
THE BARDIC BONE
As a child I read Keats, I was far too young of course and he somehow disagreed with me and now I am constantly cursed to regurgitate large chunks of him! (8) In fact one of my favourite poems is not by Keats but about him; Alice Meynell wrote an excellent poem ‘On Keats’ Grave’ which was published in 1869 and I think it captures something of the divine about the young doomed poet:
On Keats’ Grave
Down from the low hills with pines
Into the fields at rest, the summer done,
I went by pensive ways of tombs and vines
To where the place I dream of is;
And in a stretch of meditative sun
Cloven by the dark flames of the cypresses
Came to the small grave of my ended poet.
I had felt the wild things many a dreamy hour
Pushing above him from beyond the sea,
But when I saw it
It chanced there was no flower;
And that was, too, a silent time for me.
It’s simply magical and those lines: ‘I went by pensive ways of tombs and vines/to where the place I dream of is’ just pushes it beyond our reach into another dimension! It should certainly be my epitaph! (9)
I wonder if Keats would have enjoyed a Lincoln biscuit. I’m sure he would, although I see him more as a malted milk sort of man. Perhaps Housman or Hopkins would have favoured the melancholy aspect of the Lincoln! Other poets are known to have been great dunkers in their time, let us suppose them here with a great plate of assorted biscuits, who would choose which? I like to think that old Byron would be partial to the odd chocolate bourbon or two and that the lovely John Betjeman would simply melt into his armchair with a custard cream! Yeats, a little sterner perhaps would opt for the simple digestive while the wonderful Sylvia Plath would dive into the ginger nuts! Coleridge and Ted Hughes would argue over the hob nobs and covet the chocolate ones while nice Mr Browning would indeed choose nice biscuits! Rich tea would be the choice for Wordsworth (and his sister) with Keats as I have mentioned nibbling the malted milk. Larkin would be scowling across the table with a handful of coconut creams while Eliot I see as a morning coffee sort of man; Elizabeth Barrett Browning sneaks milk chocolate digestives into her tiny delicate mouth, soaked to perfection in her tea cup; Shakespeare of course, I believe to be a secret admirer of the dark chocolate digestive and Wilde goes absolutely wild over a box of assorted biscuits for he finds it difficult to choose and so picks them at random as indeed an aesthete would so as to sample all the delights that life has to offer him in the world of biscuits! (10)
Notes:
1. Other postures include: the ‘Becalmed Devil’; the ‘Vigilant Serpent’; the ‘Taut Dragon’; the ‘Braided Bear’; the ‘Gilded Unicorn’; the ‘Sedate Toad’; the ‘Tree Goat’ and the ‘Bemused Panda’. In the year 1929 the monastery consisted of 811 monks. In the present time there are only 5.5 monks.
2. The exact address of God is still unknown but it is said by those closest to him, that he toils most lovingly and industriously in the wild and beautiful plains of Ireland.
3. We cannot ascertain the exact point in time at which Lady Lo Lo lost her faith in God, or indeed father Christmas, but it most certainly occurred sometime between the goings and comings of Blue Peter presenters Tina Heath and Sarah Greene, 1979-1980, in which case our young heroine would have been eleven years old!
4. Loudun Devil: In Loudon, France, during 1634 a convent of Ursuline nuns described being visited and possessed by demonic spirits and after an investigation by the Catholic Church it was found that father Urbain Grandier (1590-1634) a parish priest of St. Pierre-du-Marche, in Loudon, was responsible for the summoning of the ‘devils’ and he was duly burnt at the stake as a witch. For further information see: ‘The Devils of Loudon’. Aldous Huxley. 1952, and also Robert Rapley’s ‘A Case of Witchcraft: the Trial of Urbain Grandier’. 1998.
5. It is not substantially correct to assume that all nuns are habitual chocolate masticators and therefore the author wishes to withdraw this statement before serious harm is done in offending the good nature of those gentle sisters of God who do such splendid work in keeping the rivers of chocolate flowing!
6. The Lincoln biscuit has attained cult status among biscuit aficionados.
7. I did! – ‘He inflicts upon the world, unique but unreadable tosh!’ [The Times. 14 September 2001] Quite right!
8. The author here advises caution as exposure to Keats, cold, at such an early age may be harmful to one’s health!
9. Alice Meynell (1847-1922) Her first poetry collection ‘Preludes’ appeared in 1875 followed by books on her essays and further poetry. To learn more about Meynell I can do no more than refer you to the excellent ‘The Slender Tree: A Life of Alice Meynell’ by June Badeni (1981) and for her complete poems: ‘The Poems of Alice Meynell’ (1923) which comprises her ‘early’, ‘later’ and ‘last poems’.
10. At this point Lady Lo Lo fell silent and stepped aside to, as she later explained, allow an angel to pass. She thus spoke no more and her monologue came to an abrupt end.
LIBER LXVII
‘The law of the strong; this is our law and the joy of the world.’
LIBER AL II:21
‘Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.’
LIBER AL I:40
‘Thou hast no right but to do thy will. Do that and no other shall say nay.’
LIBER AL I:42-3
‘Every man and every woman is a star.’
LIBER AL I:3
There is no god but man.
1. Man has the right to live by his own law:
To live in the way that he wills to do:
To work as he will:
To play as he will:
To rest as he will:
To die when and how he will.
2. Man has the right to eat what he will:
To drink what he will:
To dwell where he will:
To move as he will on the face of the earth.
3. Man has the right to think what he will:
To speak what he will:
To write what he will:
To draw, paint, carve, etch, mould, build as he will:
To dress as he will.
4. Man has the right to love as he will:
‘Take your fill and will of love as ye will,
When, where, and with whom ye will.’
LIBER AL I:51
Man has the right to kill those who would thwart these rights.
‘The slaves shall serve.’
LIBER AL II:58
‘Love is the law, love under will.’
LIBER AL I:57
The Flowered Ellipse
The Lamen of the Probationer
To renounce all in order to work the work of:
THE
WAND OF SILENCE
Excerpts from the Magickal
Diaries
Of AUDRAREP
PART TWO
Do what thou wilt shall be the
whole of the law
Saturday 1st January 1994. LBR, though feeling quite ill. I have developed
my own way of celebrating the Eucharist (1), but I have been neglecting my
magical practices recently. I go through periods of intense devotion and then
it seems to slip away – perhaps an aspect of IAO! (2) I continue to perform the
LBR (Lesser Banishing Rituals) daily.
Sunday 2nd January. LBR. I entered T (Temple) and performed the Star Ruby
and the Middle Pillar exercise and felt much better today, but I must do more
practical work!
Tuesday 4th January. LBR. Asana: kneeling. Mantra: A.M.P.H. (Aum Mani Padme
Hum), use Air element symbol and an adept appeared, ashen faced and hooded in
black; he was pointing with his right hand.
Saturday 8th January. LBR. Eucharistos. Beginning research into Enochian.
Friday 14th January. I began making preparations for the O=O Ceremony.
Saturday 15th January. LBR. Eucharistos. Star Ruby. Feeling deflated
magically and tired of that ‘demon Crowley’!
Sunday 23rd January. LBR. Eucharistos. Preparations continue concerning O=O.
Tuesday 25th January. LBR. I received Crowley’s ‘Olla’ and ‘Soul of Osiris’
from Mandrake.
Sunday 30th January. LBR. Eucharistos. Preparations continue for O=O.
Wednesday 2nd February. LBR. Asana: Legs crossed. Vibrate Chakras and
Sushumna (3) became filled by flames. Mantra: A.M.P.H. Became conscious of
Not-Being and was swallowed in the void.
Friday 4th February. LBR. It has been twelve months since I began my
probationary year (precisely 365 days since I received Regardie’s ‘Golden
Dawn’) and today marks the end of my magical probation!
Saturday 5th February. LBR. Eucharistos.
Wednesday 9th February. LBR. Reading Magick. Asana: Pan. 9-9.50 p.m. Pain
began at 9.40 p.m. but I persevered and the pain became nothing more than a glowing
sensation. A good magical day!
Thursday 10th February. LBR. Asana: 2.40 a.m. God Position. Mantra: A.M.P.H.
I began well but became disturbed by automatic movement in the left hand. I saw
an image of a ‘flowing’ man, silver and white. He was tall and radiant with an
intense light behind him. I prayed in my heart and later became conscious of a
feeling of great terror, as if I had suddenly glimpsed Choronzon (4), or worse!
Friday 11th February. LBR. In the morning I had a vision of Buddha. He was a
small statue made of clay with an almond shaped face and he sat in his asana
next to the gates of Hell. Death has taken all he has, yet he has more! He
holds his golden coins and prays. Death is envious of his coins, thinking they
have unmentionable powers and so he challenges Buddha to three ordeals. Buddha
agrees to the challenge. And so Death sends three demons to tempt Buddha over a
period of time, for what need is there of time in Hell? The first demon is a
young man, invisible to the profane and Buddha easily recognises him by his
silvery outline which appears like dew. Buddha banishes the demon by taking one
of his coins and throwing it at him. The second demon is also in male form, but
older than the previous demon. His image is much darker and not as radiant as
the other – he has a dull and heavy aura. He is more difficult than the
previous demon but Buddha destroys him. Many centuries seem to pass and the
third demon in female form with a lithe and youthful body of great beauty
appears and confronts Buddha. She is swift across his temple floor (he sits
beneath an apple tree and where the apples fall they mark the radius of his
circle or temple). She gets close to him but he is strong and defeats her. His
last coin, he rolls towards the gates of Hell and the coin grows in size and
speed and crashes into the gates, sealing damnation forever! [The coin
symbolises that all possessions are worthless – it is not that which is
without, but that which is within, that is the essence of man! Later on this
day elements of the vision were realised as the three demons appeared to me in
another reference in reality!] Also, I might add that this vision became my
magical story ‘Sudanenka’.
Saturday 12th February. LBR. Eucharistos. Reading The Goetia.
Monday 14th February. LBR. Reading Magick. Asana: 8.10-9 p.m. Pan Position.
Pain began at 8.40 p.m. and I could have continued for longer but I was
disturbed.
Tuesday 15th February. LBR. Asana: 2.30 a.m. arms outstretched forward,
hands on thighs. Mantra: A.M.P.H. Lips became dry and numb but seemed to find
moisture all of a sudden. The mantra was very rapid with minor breaks: I had to
correct the mantra twice. My hands felt heavy then became weightless and
eventually evaporated completely. I was praying from Tiphareth (5). At 3.15
a.m. or thereabouts I had a great feeling of brooding solitude – as if I was
watching myself and perhaps even laughing at the Fool. Then suddenly, I felt a
glow upon my head, upon my crown chakra, as if from nowhere; as if a gentle air
were being blown or fanned onto it (it was the top left side of the head). This
‘glowing’ moved slightly to the front of the head and increased in strength and
I made Dharana on it. Eventually the ‘glowing; faded and I slowly decreased the
mantra and ended the work at 3.25 a.m. I trembled all over, not as if cold, but
more out of fear. There was some slight sweating (it is snowing outside). I had
no notion of time, I had supposed it lasted around thirty minutes but was
surprised to see I had done fifty-five minutes. [I found the asana quite
difficult for breathing as I was unable to expand my lungs fully due to the
spine being so rigid. Deflating was not a problem when the spine is horizontal
or even slightly arched].
Wednesday 16th February. LBR. Star Ruby using mantra: A.M.P.H. and
Eucharistos – Failure! I will not travel down this path again! [From an old
magical diary before I was conscious of its significance, I invented an
alphabet of symbols and the words to express the Eucharistos were:
The Point –Hadit (man – microcosm).
The Triangle – the elements, though especially fire in this matter. Also the
Trinity: IAO – the Phallus, the Babe, the Yoni (the Male, the Child and the
Mother): Isis, Apophis, Osiris.
The Hexagram – God – the Divine Light (LVX) the Planets etc.
The Square – Tau square. Tiphareth – (kether). Four sides; four quarters;
four worlds...]
Friday 18th February. LBR. Pranayama – failure!
A note on Pranayama:
Puraka Pranayama: inhale.
Khumbhaka Pranayama: restrain (hold).
Rechaka Pranayama: exhale.
Saturday 19th February. LBR. Eucharistos.
Friday 25th February. LBR. I have been ill for the past few days.
Tuesday 1st March. LBR. Vision of LAYLAH (6) at 2.50 a.m. Gold in the
splendour of NUIT. Reading John St John.
Wednesday 2nd March. LBR. 3 a.m. Star Ruby Ritual. The breathing was slow
and rhythmical (not pranayama). LAYLAH, as mentioned; NUIT was blue and radiant
in the sky above and blazoned across it was the word LAYLAH in gold. As soon as
I was aware of it and read the letters it was gone – as if two objects or
subjects cannot co-exist together and had conjoined to form a third, which was
‘one’. Today also marks a year of performing the Lesser Banishing Rituals
daily. Reading John St John. Pranayama: Puraka= 10, Rechaka= 30, very difficult
and so had to start with Puraka= 10 and Rechaka= 20.
Thursday 3rd March. LBR. Asana: 12.10 a.m. Legs crossed. End 12.40 a.m.
Pranayama: Puraka= 6, Rechaka= 12. I did twelve minutes of this. I omitted the
Star Ruby today.
Friday 4th March. LBR. Asana: 2.30 a.m. Hanged Man Position. Vibration of
Names – difficult to control the astral form; it takes all my will to make it
go past South-West and beyond in the T (Temple) but success eventually came,
although I was unable to distinguish which way the astral is facing and which
is the real ‘cardinal point’ etc. Pranayama: Puraka= 6 (seconds), Rechaka= 12
from 2.30-2.42 a.m. It became difficult at the end of the cycle. If the lungs
are not properly deflated, it became spasmodic and it took all my concentration
to make sure I was breathing from my Solar Plexus (7). Asana: Pan Position.
9.30-10.30 p.m. Pain began at 10.15 and the body shuddered in protest at 10.20;
inwardly I was in spasm, sweating and Kundalini was on fire; the left foot
glowed white hot!
Saturday 5th March. LBR. Pranayama: 10.20-10.23 a.m. Puraka= 10, Rechaka= 20
– (only 7 cycles, I was in agony!) Eucharistos. During the earlier pranayama I
was in my Pan asana. I felt as though my lungs would burst. I tried again at
11.53 a.m. but I was interrupted. I kept trying and kept failing – I fail on
the rechaka 20, always! Try again. No asana, I stand upright. Pranayama:
Puraka= 10, Rechaka= 15, this became spasmodic. I got angry with myself and
punished myself admirably! The body is weak yet the mind is strong! I ended at
12.01 p.m. in disgust at myself! Reading Liber O – Pranayama you fool!
Pranayama! I must destroy this obstacle.
Sunday 6th March. LBR. I used the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Hexagram
and the Star Ruby Ritual (pain in heart) 2.20 a.m. At 2.45 a.m. asana: Hanged
Man Position. Pranayama: (right thumb on right nostril) – Puraka= 10, Rechaka=
20 through the left nostril. Then, left thumb on left nostril – Puraka= 10,
Rechaka= 20, through the right. I did 10 cycles. I found the right nostril
easier, due no doubt to poor posture and stomach quite full. The Hanged Man
seems an unsuitable position for this. It is better to be erect. Perhaps try a
6/12 cycle (no thumbs) with mantra: A.T.S.A. (8) – the timing will become
instinctive after a while.
3.50 p.m. LBR Hex. Pranayama: 4.25-5.00 p.m. Puraka= 6, Rechaka= 12. Also
8.00-8.30 p.m. same cycle (6/12). This was easily achieved after conquering the
5/10. Reading Liber O and 777.
Monday 7th March. LBR. 2.34 a.m. Star Ruby. Pranayama: Puraka= 10, Rechaka=
20 – I was unable to master it and decided to tackle it from another angle: begin
with 5/10 and add one second to each cycle until I reach 10/20. I find when
attempting the 10/20 it usually creates some sort of visionary hallucination
such as I saw ‘a barren landscape, covered in snow. The sky was jet black, but
the brilliance of the snow was illuminating the mountain peaks!’
LBR Pent and Hex 11.45 a.m. and again at 3.50 p.m. Pranayama: 4.25-5.00 p.m.
Puraka= 5, Rechaka= 10. Quite easy and tempted to move on to the 6/12 or even
7/14 – a foolish thought! Mantra: A.T.S.A. and A.M.P.H. I could have done much
more. I will do another 5/10 and declare it mastered! [11.40 a.m. did 5 minutes
pranayama in the God Position: 6/12 and found it very easy to do, no doubt to
the absence of food in the stomach. I will do another 6/12 and move on to 7/14.
Tuesday 8th March. LBR 3.05 a.m. Pent and Hex. Also the Star Ruby. The adept
was robed and consciousness was transferred to the astral without much
difficulty. Usually there is a feeling of being pulled backwards into the
physical, or trying to turn one’s whole being in another direction, which
produces a feeling of duality, and the question: which is real? i.e. physical,
and which is only ‘desired’ to be real? Eyes open on the physical shell and
turning of the form in different directions etc. The brain seemed to accept the
idea that the body of light was becoming semi-solid, at will, or so it was
fooled into thinking. The new form can travel at will in any direction –
vertical, horizontal: Air became Earth, the conjunction between the ethereal
and the physical.
Wednesday 9th March. LBR. Pranayama: 6/12 in the God Position 2.59-3.05 p.m.
Very easy to do and tempted to move onto the 7/14 but I have to make sure I am
ready. [Pranayama in these early stages are not recorded fully, not until 10/20
does the work begin!] Stomach empty – asana: 4.30-5.15 p.m. back straight and
legs crossed. This was unplanned and I suddenly found myself in this asana and
carried on automatically. The pain began at 5.00 p.m.
Thursday 10th March. LBR. 2.45 a.m. Star Ruby. Dharana on white cross.
Breathing good, slow and rhythmic. I became sleepy after only one minute and
counted three breaks.
Friday 11th March. LBR. 10.20-10.30 a.m. Pranayama: 7/14, quite difficult
but when the rhythm is mastered I can move on to 8/16, but not before! I had a
strange vision in which I was talking with Therion and he told me how to
pronounce certain words: ‘Therion, Nuit, Babalon’ (he stopped me here and said
pronounce it ‘Fabalon’) we continued ‘Hadit...’ (9)
Saturday 12th March. LBR and Star Ruby. Pranayama: 2.40 a.m. 7/14 became a
little spasmodic. But after ten minutes something quite amazing happened – all
of a sudden I was aware of a blue light in my Ajna (10) – I had to check to see
that I wasn’t fooling myself by having my eyes open – they were tight shut!
Everything became harmonious – there were no spasms and the pranayama seemed to
glide over the places where spasms were without any effect from them, but I was
still aware of where these spasms were, as if they were small, mountain peaks,
they just did not concern me or interrupt the flow.
I produced a diagram to show this: A. Shows the condition of Pranayama
before this illumination, where the spasms assert themselves into the
Puraka/Rechaka Pranayama, and B shows how the breath seemed to glide over the
spasms, but at the same time, acknowledge their existence and positions in
space.
This went on for quite some time and the blue light was penetrating – maybe
this vibrant blue light is something to do with LVX? I fear I have not fully
perceived it, only glimpsed its magnificence. The blue light faded and with it
went the smooth flowing continuous breath, and the A stage in the diagram
appeared once more. Also in the B stage I noticed that my sense of hearing had
changed, it became much more acute. The work ended at 3.10 a.m. [note: spasms
are possibly vibrations from the heart beat]
08.00 a.m. LBR. Pranayama: 7/14. At 08.15 I changed the cycle to 8/16 which
was more difficult and it took a lot of concentration. End work at 08.20 a.m.
Asana: 8.10-9.20 p.m. Left leg bent behind right leg, right leg bent and
heel cloaking the Phallus. This didn’t seem as painful as my usual Pan
Position. The pain began at 9 p.m. and it increased quite severely at 9.15 p.m.
Pranayama: 8/16 (8.10-8.37 p.m.) Duration: 27.5 minutes. Not happy with this,
quite spasmodic and difficult, probably due to stomach not being completely
empty, though not full in any way. I had to end at eight thirty seven and a
half minute; I could fight the pain, but oh how I fought for that half a minute
of victory. My chest was rising unnaturally, and my legs were trembling.
Conclusion: don’t eat with your mouth full!
Sunday 13th March. LBR. Pranayama: 3.35-3.52 p.m. Cycle: 8/16. Duration:
17.5 minutes. Quite spasmodic and stomach slightly full – not happy with the
exercise at all! Left side of chest hurt and chest felt strained at the end. I
found that the body became very fidgety and my legs and arms were flailing
about in attempts to distract my mind from the pain; these movements began
unconsciously. I attempted the same later (8/16) at 8.55-9.00 p.m. I intended
to do 20-30 minutes but I was disturbed. Sometime after 9.15 p.m. when I went
out for a walk, these lines entered my head unwilled:
I whirl in the mystical light,
I am not of your earth or your world;
Although, I am close to your night:
I am the midnight flower unfurled!
Monday 14th March. LBR. Pranayama: 9/18. I began at 1.45 p.m. and ended at
2.08 p.m. duration: 23 minutes. Slight headache and stomach quite empty, except
for half a slice of toast. It began easy enough for the first few cycles, then
became more difficult and spasmodic, before getting easier again at 2.00 p.m.
[This resembles the formula of IAO: Isis – enthusiasm and love for the work;
Apothis the Dying God (Osiris) – all is confusion and the work becomes
detestable; Osiris, the redemption, the risen God and a new enthusiasm for the
work: the assistance of the universe, all thy hard work has become virtuous!]
At the end of the practice the chest was a little painful (Tiphareth),
over-straining of the lungs.
Tuesday 15th March. LBR. Pranayama: 2.25-2.29 p.m. 9/18 cycle. I found it
very difficult to do this and had to stop after only four minutes due to
exhaustion. The stomach was quite empty too. I tried again at 6.15-6.30 p.m.
(9/18 cycle). Duration: 15 minutes. The first two or three cycles appeared
quite easy to maintain, but became very difficult very quickly, in fact it was
extreme agony. My breath was racing; my chest (diaphragm) was in spasm much
like having hiccoughs. I just wanted it to end, but I persevered to make it
fifteen minutes (I don’t know if I may be doing something wrong, somewhere?) My
upper body was flapping about to distract the mind as I counted the seconds on
the clock. The chest is a little painful yet I can’t stop, I must go on to
enslave the dreaded 9/18!
Wednesday 16th March. LBR. Pranayama: 02.50-03.25 a.m. 9/18 cycle. Duration:
35 minutes. Asana: legs crossed and hands on thighs. Much better than I have
ever achieved! After a few minutes came the sweating; it did not completely
manifest, but maintained a steady rate. I saw where I was making my mistakes in
the ‘half-way’ stage. I was inflating my chest too fully and my stomach muscles
were unable to fully contract – to compensate for this, on breathing in, I kept
my back rigid, and on breathing out, I bent forwards a little, to ease the
diaphragm and eradicate the spasms. I found this very successful. I became
aware of a sensation of movement: rising, floating, twisting, turning and
general displacement of conscious self etc. I noticed three specific spasms
during my cycle:
Pranayama: 07.40-08.00 a.m. 9/18 cycle. Asana: legs straight, hands on Mulhadara
(base of the spine) (11). This began extremely well with a smooth continuous
flow of breath; deep without any spasms, due to an empty stomach I presume. At
07.50 a.m. I changed to 10/20. This also appeared quite easy to do and I
continued for ten minutes, but I could have done much longer, but I had decided
upon a time at which to end the work and end it there I did. There was no
rushing to expel the air and no spasms at all – must be due to stomach!
9.44 p.m. Put no validity of success into these results – the lust of
success and victory are not the aim! It is the work and the recording thereof!
Friday 18th March. LBR. Pranayama: 1.20 p.m. 10/20 cycle. Asana: Dragon
Position. Failure! I could only manage one cycle, and that badly! I attempted
again at 1.22 p.m. – also failure! One cycle done well! Asana: my Pan Position:
10-10.40 p.m. Pain began at 10.25 p.m. I also intended to do pranayama, but at
10 p.m. I could not even manage one cycle of 10/20!
Saturday 19th March. LBR. Pranayama: 02.50 a.m. 10/20 cycle. I could only
manage to do three cycles before I became breathless. Pranayama: 07.55-08.10
a.m. 10/20 cycles. I managed to do thirty cycles (empty stomach, it must be the
key!). I found it quite easy to do although I became aware that sometimes there
would be a spasm at Rechaka 17, maybe due to posture. I will continue with
10/20 until I am satisfied with the results, and then proceed as stated in the
Equinox.
Sunday 20th March. LBR. Pranayama: 02.55-03.02 a.m. 10/20 cycle. Duration: 7
minutes. Done quite well, considering I had quite a full stomach, though it
wasn’t as smooth as I’d prefer! I woke from some disturbing dream at 04.20 a.m.
Pranayama: 07.01-07.26 a.m. 10/20 cycle. Duration: 25 minutes. A nice and
easy flow; I could have gone on much further, but I had allowed myself
twenty-five minutes for the exercise. Stomach empty: always better results in
the morning before eating. Also after this I ‘vibrated’ my mantra: A.M.P.H. in
my Ajna and raced into sleep. Asana: 6.22-7.15 p.m. Duration: 53 minutes.
Extreme pain in feet and ankles at the end of the practice!
Monday 21st March. LBR [An XC the Vernal Equinox] (12). I had a vision
concerning a musical instrument: a metal frame containing long metal tubes or
bars which appeared solid; similar in construction to the tubular bells. These
metal bars could be set in such a way as to play notes in various order and length,
and by heating the metal (expanding and contracting) the melody could be played
indefinitely... A bright light filled my eyes, radiating and brilliant; I am
conscious of it, the suddenly my Ajna is flooded with some intricate pattern,
like a magnified section of embroidery. It was white with a black design,
giving the appearance of ‘fabric’ – the flowered ellipse! I had to check that
my eyes were completely closed and that I wasn’t seeing some physical
representation, which I wasn’t. I found I was able to hold the image for long
periods. These visions happened quite frequently and I called them ‘fabric’
visions because of their nature – are they just some splendid form of Dharana?
I remember having them in my childhood and not understanding what they were or
how to control them at will but the feeling of euphoria attached to them
produced a strange sensation that my young mind delighted in yet also feared!
Tuesday 22nd March. LBR. Asana: 02.55-03.32 a.m. Left leg bent; right leg
straight. Arms crossed on Solar Plexus.
a) Pranayama: 02.55-03.22 a.m. 10/20 cycle. Stomach not completely empty.
Duration: 27.5 minutes. Began quite spasmodic but it seemed to ease. I realised
that instead of using my chest to breathe, I had automatically used my Solar
Plexus and this stopped any spasms, completely. Towards the end of pranayama I
noticed a sensation in the Svadisthana Chakra (Yesod) (13). The sensation was
that of rushing air over that part of the body, as if being fanned by a gentle
breeze: Yesod – element: Air.
b) Tatwa: Began at 03.25 a.m. Triangle – noticed two breaks which were more
than a second long in duration, [other breaks were minor of which were too
numerous to mention]. I attempted to open my eyes and see the image of the
Tatwa before me, which was quite successful. Ended at 03.32 a.m. Duration: 7
minutes, 25 seconds, at which time I also ended the asana.
Pranayama: after LBR – 10/20 cycle. 07.30-07.40 a.m. I used the Solar Plexus
again for five minutes then changed to the chest, which was much better and
deeper, due maybe to the Solar Plexus taming the spasms – it seemed to float
over them and not be disturbed by them. Stomach quite empty; weather: raining.
At 07.55 a.m. progressed onto visualisation of a moving pendulum (dharana) till
08.00 a.m. Minor breaks on examining the swinging pendulum points etc and ‘how
easy this is!’ – Larger break where strangely I was attempting to cut a pie in
half. The swing of the pendulum seems difficult to keep at the same rate.
Wednesday 23rd March. LBR. 02.55 a.m. Chakras (burning sensation).
Pranayama: 03.00 a.m. 10/20 cycle. I managed 11.5 minutes in duration. Began
spasmodic and used Solar Plexus to calm it! I felt its great force flow through
me, as if I were merely its vessel. Stomach not completely empty. Began to
sweat – felt on the edge of consciousness; at the threshold of death. If I was
able to continue for longer (of which I wasn’t), I’m sure I would have been
covered in Prana (energy – forced outward, through the skin). Pranayama:
09.15-0929 a.m. 10/20 cycle. No real difficulty.
Friday 25th March. LBR. Pranayama: Puraka= 5, Khumbhaka= 10, Rechaka= 20,
(5/10/20 cycle). 02.45-02.50 a.m. Difficult as alcohol was present. Puraka and
Khumbhaka were fine, but I raced during Rechaka. (I could hardly hear the
ticking of the clock so I must have invented my own duration of seconds to fit
with my breathing). I will try another pranayama other than 10/20 – consult
Magick.
Pranayama: 4.05 p.m. 10/20 cycles. Puraka through ida (holding the left
nostril with the left thumb) and Rechaka through pingala (holding the right
nostril with the right thumb). Changed to left thumb on left nostril (ida)
breathing through the right (pingala). I could only manage two cycles.
Position: Thunderbolt asana. I will have to go back and start with either 7/14
or 8/16 and work towards the 10/20 again!
Saturday 26th March. LBR and Star Ruby. Pranayama: 03.00-03.14 a.m. 10/20
cycle. Very good, deep breaths; used whole of my body; straining to get every
ounce of air out of my lungs and every ounce of air in! I definitely felt a
rigid state – I have found my Sushumna [the fire at the base of the spine; the
Kundalini: ida= moon, pingala= sun – the Nadi: three occult centres] felt as if
someone else were breathing for me, a separateness or duality – instead of the
force acting as two magnets repelling one another (a), it was a smooth flow
(b):
Pranayama: 03.16 a.m. with ida and pingala (6/12 cycle).
Pingala: right nostril, Puraka through left nostril, 6 seconds, the Rechaka,
out through left for 12 seconds.
Ida: left nostril, Puraka through right nostril, 6 seconds, then Rechaka,
out through right for 12 seconds.
Increased cycle to 8/16, then 9/18 and also 10/20: No spasms at all; it
seemed quite easy to do! Pingala a bit blocked. Ended at 03.27 a.m. Duration:
11.5 minutes. Mantra: A.M.P.H. till 03.35 a.m. I kept it going quite well,
fixed on my Ajna (the two petals). I felt as if I have entered some sort of
peaceful state [Osiris Risen]. I won’t do ida and pingala again until my pingala
is functioning properly. This may take some time as there have been problems
for many years with it.
Pranayama: 07.55-08.15 a.m. 10/20 cycle [07.55-08.05 a.m. I began with a
10/20 cycle which was very good. Stomach empty; breathe deep. At 08.05 a.m. I
changed to a 5/5/20 cycle which was also quite easy to perform, (I shall
increase proportions in time). End at 08.15 a.m. Mantra: A.M.P.H. beginning at
08.16 a.m. and ending at 08.30 a.m. Duration: 14 minutes. I kept the mantra
soft and audible; my lips were rippling and my throat was extremely dry. Usual
breaks: a) to swallow, b) to yawn, c) unwanted thoughts arising (though there
were few). I finished the exercise but kept the mantra vibrating into sleep –
dharana on tip of nose.
Sunday 27th March. LBR. Pranayama: 5/10/20m cycle. 03.51 a.m. (B.S.T.)
Failure! I could not even manage one cycle! I rose on Rechaka 14 seconds with a
shock of disgust! Asana: Legs crossed, hands on Solar Plexus. 03.45-04.11 a.m.
(B.S.T. [British Summer Time]) Pranayama: 5/5/20 cycle – much better! I put the
whole of my ‘being’ into Rechaka. This caused a slight sweating. Duration:
seventeen and three quarter minutes! Also, last night I did an exercise on
breathing (steady and evenly) saying to myself: ‘I breathe in, I breathe out!’
this then became: ‘we breathe in, we breathe out!’ and finally: ‘you breathe
in, you breathe out!’
Tuesday 29th March. LBR. Pranayama: 03.15-03.25 a.m. 6/6/20 cycle. This is
my limit for the present! I cannot go beyond it without difficulty: I had to
use my hands to push every drop of air from my lungs. I saw many colours appear
to me like clouds of gas: violet, blue, and to a lesser extent yellow/red. I
was on the edge of consciousness and there was a continuous ringing in my ears.
Wednesday 30th March. LBR. Mantra: A.M.P.H. 02.42 a.m. I kept it very well
into first stages of sleep and expected to receive the Nada, alas! Some breaks,
especially of the mantra changing spontaneously which had to be corrected. A
definite feeling as to an opening of the Ajna – between the two pillars
(severity and mercy) a dark vista beckons – floating sensation. During the
morning vision: Satellites were orbiting space with magnificently powerful
light beams, as strong and bright as the sun. All of them were directed towards
earth, to obliterate the night with permanent light. I saw America (possibly
New York) ablaze with these artificial light beams, which seemed to criss-cross
the globe!
Thursday 31st March. LBR. Mantra: A.M.P.H. 02.50 a.m. (I did not feel well
enough to do pranayama). Invocation of Adonai. Mantra in to sleep; it went well
over the invocation and even into the dream state. A few minor breaks, quite
long in duration, but corrected swiftly. The aim: to continue the mantra
unbroken through sleep and wake with it still flowing from my lips – like a
chattering lunatic! Invocation of Adonai was later granted, thus successful:
all defences were destroyed and I was the victor! [This has happened with
success on other occasions too – an internal current is created and discharged
towards the object!]
Friday 1st April. LBR. I was unable to do any work. Received another vision
I have called ‘fabric’. It began as I thought I was looking at an old coin. I
had to check that my eyes were closed, which they were! I reached out
physically for the coin but I felt nothing! Then the ‘fabric’ began. Dozens or
hundreds of different design patterns per second flooded my consciousness – all
in black and white, no colour, and all of fancy, intricate floral patterns. I
don’t understand it, but I am able to keep the vision fixed on a single image
for quite a long period of time. Is it an hallucination? Another vision I
received after this was: a woman had strange markings on her breasts,
colourful, like some sort of stigmatic birthmark. There was also a man who had
large staring eyes and long hair. He tore open his shirt to reveal the same
markings on his chest. The man and the woman came together and their markings
inter-locked like some sort of jig-saw puzzle, and from this – the advancement
of civilisation had begun! He spoke to the woman: ‘I am the only male who bears
these markings, and there are twenty-eight females who bear them also. My
purpose is to couple with all of those females who bear the markings and I will
search to the ends of the earth to find them: I have completed the task for you
are the last remaining female and the advancement has begun!’
Saturday 2nd April. LBR. Pranayama: 03.00-03.12 a.m. 6/6/20 cycle. Asana:
Legs crossed. Surprisingly quite easy to do! Stomach almost empty. Began to
sweat and throat became extremely dry. I had to stop after twelve and a half
minutes due to acid rising in the throat. Pranayama: 10.15-10.25 a.m. 10/30
cycle. Again it was surprisingly easy to do and I felt as if I could have done
much more with Rechaka, but I wisely kept it at thirty! I had to stop after ten
minutes because the last two cycles caused me to gasp for air (maybe because I
unconsciously moved onto my side a little in asana).
Sunday 3rd April. LBR. Pranayama: 03.00 a.m. 15/30 cycle. Failure! Not even
one cycle! Pranayama: 03.01 a.m. 10/20 cycle. Even this seemed a little
difficult – stomach not fully empty. I finished the practice at 03.11 a.m.
Mantra: A.M.P.H. 03.12 a.m. and into sleep. At 04.25 a.m. I awoke from sleep to
find the mantra faintly still there but I was more concerned with a vision I
was having (not ‘fabric’): There was no colour, only black and white and I saw
some old buildings and rooftops (possibly old farm buildings). There was a
country lane and I saw stairs on the outside of the building which led to a
side door... and here the vision ended.
Tuesday 5th April. LBR. An exercise in Liber Thisharb (sub figura cmxiii) –
02.43 a.m. Breathing calmly in a relaxed posture; I proceeded to travel
backwards through the last 24 hours. I began easy enough, but towards midday
etc, things became disordered. But I knew what and where the correct order was,
so not a pointless exercise. I ended at 02.47 a.m. Pranayama: 02.50 a.m.
5/5/20. Asana: Legs straight, hands on Mulhadara. Stomach quite full; not too
difficult, some minor spasms, but corrected using the Solar Plexus, pushing it
out to deflate the lungs! End at 03.04 a.m. Mantra: A.M.P.H. into sleep.
Pranayama: 09.30 a.m. 10/5/20 cycle. Extremely easy to do, no doubt to the
fact I had an empty stomach. I wanted to increase it to 20/20/20 to make it the
whole minute, but I decided against it and continued with 10/5/20. No spasms at
all, a smooth continuous flow. I ended at 09.50 a.m. and went into ida and
pingala for the same cycle 10/5/20. Also quite easy! I feel the spasms are just
the triggers of the mind informing the lungs to breathe in and out etc, a sort
of warning signal, and gradually by ignoring them, one is open to anything –
suspension of time, forwards and backwards; levitation... or are these the
ravings of a mad man? Pingala was a little blocked as usual.
Vision: It began at a point on someone’s face (Hadit) and expanded to reveal
the head and the whole body (Nuit). The head belonged to a helmeted soldier or
warrior (my first impression was that he was a German infantry soldier from the
Second World War). The scene developed and I saw many soldiers in a row. Their
helmets were small and circular. It was as if they were waiting to board an
aircraft; one man appeared and he was wearing a short black leather jacket
(pilot). He had something in his hands: a small box which he presented to
someone, behind a wire fence. The vision faded here and I could not retrieve
it, no matter how hard I tried. My consciousness in the vision had complete
control to go where it willed in any direction.
Wednesday 6th April. LBR. Asana: 03.05 a.m. similar to the Bear position,
only on my back. Dharana on R.C. [Rosy Cross]. I began by putting my whole
‘being’ into my Mulhadara Chakra then used the Middle Pillar Exercise
(Kundalini), activating each Chakra centre. How they pulse and ache! Rose, at
the base of the brain: R.C. at the back of the skull and flung forcibly into
the Ajna where the image was kept. Bright, vibrant and soft, delicate Rose
attached to the strong permanence of the Cross. Its secret formula became
clear: how it withers and dies (slain – dying god) and is perfected in
Resurrection (Osiris Risen) – Tetragrammaton (14): Yod, He, Vau, He (final). Is
the Rose conscious of the cross and vice versa? It grows, as in a spiritual
growth and is born anew.
Thursday 7th April. LBR. 02.45 a.m. an exercise concerning Liber Berashith;
better than the previous exercise. End at 02.57 a.m.
Pranayama: 03.00-03.12 a.m. 10/20 cycle, no Khumbhaka. Very good, hands on
Solar Plexus; I began to sweat, especially during Rechaka, as I strained to get
every drop of air out. Stomach quite empty. On Puraka, I started to tremble, as
if on some enormous threshold.
Pranayama: 09.45-09.55 a.m. 10/10/20 cycle. I began well enough. Stomach
empty. I had to use my hands to forcibly push the air out, and bend the head
slightly, a little spasmodic – this is my limit for the present!
Friday 8th April. LBR. The writing of the Book of the Law! 6.15-7.10 p.m. I
worked on an ink illustration commemorating the Equinox of the Gods.
Saturday 9th April. LBR. Pranayama: 03.35-03.50 a.m. 10/20 cycle with
mantra: A.M.P.H. My lips became very dry and numb, very tired and thus some
interference.
Tatwa: 03.50 a.m. ‘Prithivi-Vayu’ [circle within a square] in Ajna. The
circle is imprisoned by the square but the square is also a prisoner of the
circle, they exist as one in duality. Both are of a single line, yet the square
has four angles while the circle has none. Square= earth – Malkuth; the circle=
air, thus ‘air of earth’. There was a break during this which seemed to
transcend time (Berashith), and I got a distinct impression that the beginning
of a war was raging – a strong impression concerning Joan of Arc. I broke from
it and returned to the Tatwa: the squaring of the circle!
Mantra: A.M.P.H. 07.40 a.m. into sleep. I observed the writing of the second
chapter of the Book of the Law.
Sunday 10th April. LBR. Pranayama: 07.35-07.50 a.m. 12/12/24 cycle. Stomach
empty. This became difficult to do towards the end and I found myself letting
my breath out in short bursts as opposed to one continuous flow. Asana: 07.51
a.m. Bear position but on back. Tatwa: Tejas-Apas [crescent in a triangle]. The
triangle= fire and the crescent= water. I concentrated on the symbol and made
it rise from my Mulhadara Chakra (Kundalini) to ‘Daath’ [throat] (15). Tatwa in
the base of the brain [Yoni] and reflected into the Ajna where I willed it to
stay. Mantra: A.M.P.H. (good results, strong and clear). I counted five breaks:
four to correct the angles of the triangle and make them straight etc and one
break concerned a person I had not seen for some time. The symbol seemed to
flash within and without, flooding my senses. I was very happy with the
exercise and ended at 08.07 a.m. this was followed by many visions of which I
call ‘fabric’ – in one, I was immersed in a blue radiant light, and I became
conscious of my feet. All of a sudden my feet appeared in front of my eyes (my
physical eyes were closed but the feeling was exactly the same as if I were
looking straight at them in close up; it was actually the third eye). It was as
if on thinking of my feet, in an infinitesimal flash, I had travelled to meet my
feet (via the outside of my physical body). My nose was actually pressed
against my feet and the blue light showered over me. I could hold the image
quite distinctly. It appears this ‘fabric’ is becoming more prominent and
easier to do.
At 11.30 a.m. I returned from another vision: I was guided into a dark room,
not completely dark, but very dim. There was an angel, or so she appeared to
be: she was actually a sylph, an inhabitant of the aethyr of Air – Yetzirah,
the Formative World (16). She had bright scarlet lips and was exceedingly pale.
I gave her a magical word that had been given to me earlier in the vision (try
as I did I could not remember the word after the vision, but I am sure it began
‘Daleth’). The sylph blew down a musical pipe, and her radiant voice echoed
down the tube. Suddenly, a masculine figure appeared – it was Pan, whose number
is 131. He had two small horns from his temples (more mounds than horns); his
hair was short and golden, but he was completely human in essence (human male
lower half, not the expected goat limbs). I repeated the magical word to him,
but I made a mistake and the sylph corrected it. I was led into a room, which
was dark (but probably lit with burning torches). Pan began sniffing at some
dust or ‘powder’, blue-grey in colour and rather dull. The sylph also took the
dust and made a strange face as if she were going to sneeze. Pan offered the
dust to me and I said: ‘I am unable to!’ Pan, the sylph and a small youth who
had entered the room were now sitting upon a floating altar. The altar hung at
least 7-8 feet above the floor and swayed a little back and forth but it did
not seem to be attached to anything, it hung in mid-air. There were small brick
columns at each corner of the square altar which rose up into the air, but did
not go anywhere in particular. I raised my arms [the sign of Apothis and Typhon
– an LVX sign] (17) and mounted the altar, aided by Pan. The altar was made of
red bricks (or tiles) with a design in the centre of the altar – some deity,
possibly Bacchus. The bricks (tiles) were not held in place by any fixative,
they were loose and they rippled like water. I wanted the altar to remain still
and not move and then as I thought this, Pan gave the altar a great shake,
which turned it completely round one-hundred and eighty degrees on to its side.
One side went down, but three other sides were raised into the air. The columns
had disappeared and there was disharmony. The idea is opposite: To achieve
balance (equilibrium) the heavier side goes up (which contained Pan, the sylph
and the youth) and the lighter side goes down (me). I tried to correct it by
moving my body, but it was useless. I later learnt that the altar can only be
completely controlled from its centre. And Pan spoke, saying something similar
to ‘however hard one tries, there will always exist an opposite; the
counteraction of the strong by the strong!’ (He said the words while glaring at
me for not having the correct knowledge to use the altar).
I observed the third day of the writing of the Book of the Law.
Tuesday 12th April. LBR. I intended to do pranayama but a sore throat
prevented me. 02.37 a.m. I used the mantra I tried before: ‘I breathe in, I
breathe out’ etc. After quite some time I disconnected myself from the physical
and used the LBR and the invocation of the Pentagram of Air and assumed the
God-form of Shu (18). I then used the mantra: A.M.P.H. and became conscious of
a very loud and deep booming or bellowing voice which seemed war-like and it
was giving commands. Then a voice followed, saying: ‘Thou shalt not invoke me,
until thou hast prayed in thine heart and vibrated the words [meaning mantra or
God names] for every bead of sweat upon my body!’ The blue light was blinding.
I had the Air symbol fixed firmly in my Ajna.
Wednesday 13th April. LBR. Throat still sore. Tatwa: black egg, symbol of
Spirit, in my Ajna. 02.55 a.m. Mantra: A.M.P.H. Immediately a flood of images
entered my mind – I saw vast cities, one after the other; golden temples and
narrow walkways (passages) – I don’t like this, I get the sensation that I am
being fooled, probably by myself. The black egg is in a temple and it sits
between two pillars (Severity and Mercy). It is dimly lit. Flames are
flickering over the black egg. I find my consciousness is inside the egg and
there is Dharana upon the egg, which is infinite, like the Russian dolls
(Matroshka). There is a blue light about the egg...
Thursday 14th April. LBR. 03.00 a.m. I disconnected from the physical. Used
the LBR and invocation Pentagram of Water, making the sign (not the symbol) of
the downward pointing triangle; I returned to the physical, the triangle in the
Mulhadara, rising to the Ajna. Mantra: A.M.P.H. the triangle image quite strong
and held for quite some time. I did not proceed any further, extremely tired
and stomach full.
Saturday 16th April. LBR. Still have a sore throat. No pranayama, also Ida
and Pingala blocked but not seriously. 03.50 a.m. Mantra: A.M.P.H. – useless!
Unable to keep it fixed and keep breaking off into silly reverie. Vision: 11.30
a.m. A young and beautiful, dark-haired girl (she was mentally ill) and around
eighteen years old but she had the mind of a child with all its naive wonder.
She was lonely, except for her family, who never gave her the attention she
craved. But she was loved. She would sit in a small room in the house, possibly
a cloakroom, and dream all day long. She told her young brother how she went
down a long, dark chimney to another world, where giants lived. She’d been
twice already and was planning to go again. This would be the last time she
goes alone, and she promised to take her brother next time! At night, she crept
into the cloakroom in the dark and sat down. There was blackness and tumbling,
falling deeper and deeper, down a large chimney. When she hit the ground she
became buried in soot and ashes, in a fireplace that was barely alight. She was
still in the room, but the room was the size of a small coin, hitting the soot
and becoming buried. A voice bellowed: ‘The fire is out!’ It was such an angry
voice. My consciousness seemed to be everywhere, observing the scene in the
vision. Three tall men (giants) all blonde, short hair and blue eyes were in
the room. The room was dim. Now the girl became larger, in fact, her usual
size, in the fireplace, all dirty with soot and a voice said: ‘Why have you
come here again when we told you not to?’ She answered, but I do not remember
her reply. The man gazed at her, and he began to bend her with his will. He
uttered: ‘We created you (meaning mankind) and we have formulated your brain!’
the girl was crying in pain and fear. His eyes burnt into her. I thought he was
going to cure her mind, but no, and I was repelled by what I saw him do to her.
He ripped out her eyes – now she is blind; he sealed up her mouth – now she is
mute, and he twisted every limb so that she cannot walk or use her hands and
arms. And I felt the sorrow of the world when I saw her crawling back home to
her family, who were all in tears. I later worked on an illustration called
‘the Eyes of Pharaoh’.
Sunday 17th April. LBR. Pranayama: 09.10-09.20 a.m. 5/5/20 cycle. Ida and
Pingala quite blocked sore throat too. No enthusiasm at all to do the practice
and this damn cold won’t go away! I feel that I am not doing enough! Mantra:
A.M.P.H. into sleep. Attempted Dharana on right ear, partial success, but I
fear I have hit the dry sands of the desert!
Tuesday 19th April. LBR. 02.53 a.m. Consciousness in Mulhadara Chakra. The
flame rose – kundalini, to Solar Plexus when it became a hundred-fold golden
rays, then white brilliance, on entering Kether, and descending back to the
Solar Plexus. Tiphareth: sun and moon conjoined (solar/lunar: the Beast and
Babalon). I fixed a swinging pendulum in my Ajna, one second per swing using
mantra: A.M.P.H. (pendulum good only a few breaks) Mantra= one cycle per swing,
i.e. per second. I got the distinct feeling my physical eyes were open,
although they were closed; I could see objects about the room, though not
distinctly. This lasted for quite some time, even into sleep. (Maybe I awoke
and thought: ‘Why am I not doing my mantra?’ and I would suddenly do the mantra
immediately after the thought. I also performed the LBR in a sort of half awake
half asleep state).
9.15 p.m. I went for a walk and I could not help noticing my senses
heightened and alert to every subtle element: earth, water (particularly), fire
(burning wood), and air. I felt the harmonious nature and composition of
everything connected around me. Some lines suddenly sprung to mind:
I am but a leaf tossed this way and that,
In the subtle stuff of life;
Gaze on my face, gaze and tremble:
Yea! Tremble, wither and wake!
I later began reading the Equinox vol I, number vii.
Wednesday 20th April. LBR. 02.48 a.m. Tatwa: Fire (red triangle) in Ajna.
Mantra: A.M.P.H. Fool! I was intoxicated by alcohol! Pranayama: 08.00-08.15
a.m. 10/5/20 cycle. A bit spasmodic to begin with and Ida and Pingala quite
blocked, I also have a sore throat: when will it end?
Thursday 21st April. LBR. 03.02 a.m. Chakras in the sign of water (downwards
pointing triangle); the Goddess Auromoth (19). I entered the T (Temple) and
made the invoking Pentagram of Water in the four cardinal points and an
Invocation of the Goddess Auromoth in the sign of the grade of water. Rise into
the air, still in the sign of water using the mantra: A.M.P.H. White brilliance
and ears ringing... Vision: I was standing at a roadside; a country Lane, very
barren, and I was with another gentleman and we were both dressed as princes.
On the other side of the road, directly opposite, came a rumbling sound as of
thunder. Then, from a grassy mound appeared the head of a dragon. It was
extremely fierce and angry at having been sent to find me. I was afraid and
stood behind the other gentleman, pretending that I hadn’t even noticed the
beast’s arrival. And the dragon said: ‘Do you not agree that my ears are real?’
– ‘Yes’ I replied. ‘Therefore,’ said the dragon, ‘you must agree that I am
real!’ and after saying this he came fully out of the earth to his full
stature. He towered above us, but in an instant, he decreased in size to match
our own height. He was a man who bore the head of a dragon. I asked him his
name, and he replied: ‘Cheva’ and he continued to tell me that he had been sent
to find me and test my knowledge. He came at me as if to destroy me; he was
powerful and I could not defeat him by strength. I thought – ‘I must destroy
him from within; from the very core of his being: by shaming him!’ and at once
I began hurling insults so degrading at him that their effect showed physical
signs upon his appearance that he was weakening, and I toppled him to the
ground when I implied that every being knows what he does amongst the swine,
for he has been seen lusting after the pigs! And he fell at once and shrivelled
up! – I learnt later that he had been sent by no less a figure than the dreaded
Choronzon! [see entry for Monday 25th April]
Friday 22nd April. LBR. ‘Make thee an island and fortify it!’
Saturday 23rd April. LBR. 03.32 a.m. Asana: Legs crossed, hands on thighs –
breathe slow and deep. Chakras. Compound Tatwa: Spirit of Earth (oval within a
square) in Ajna. Mantra: A.M.P.H. Some short minor breaks at the beginning
(keeping the correct colours etc). Then a strange calm came over me. I was
aware that my hands were resting upon my thighs, but felt as if they were not
my hands at all, but someone else’s! There were no feelings in my hands
whatsoever – therefore, my consciousness tells me they’re not my hands. But my
thighs still had feelings, so I knew that there was something called hands
(though not mine), resting upon them. Ajna was good; the Prithivi-Vayu (tatwa)
very clear. Mantra racing – I failed at the threshold! I was overcome by
tiredness. Pranayama: 09.00-09.20 a.m. 10/8/20 cycle. Quite easy to do; sore
throat getting me down a little (Ida and Pingala are constantly blocked now).
Sunday 24th April. LBR. 02.18 a.m. Asana: similar to Bear only on my back.
Enter the Akasik egg (black egg/oval, earth tatwa) in a sort of foetal
position, surrounded by vibrant blue light. I rise upwards in Tatwa. Mantra:
A.M.P.H. which went well. From a tremendous height I viewed the sea and the
mountains and the cities. I became numb... everything seemed to go blank!
Perhaps sleep overcame me? I don’t know why I am so tired? 06.35 a.m. Invoke
Pentagram and Hexagram. Mantra: A.M.P.H. – one large break and a few smaller on
forgetting my mantra.
Monday 25th April. LBR. 02.45 a.m. Mantra: A.M.P.H. – five breaks and sleep.
Afternoon: some discoveries about the vision of Thursday 21st April:
CHEVA – the Beast 666
A Ch I H A = 666 (usual spelling:
Chiva)
In full: A= 111, Ch= 418, I= 20, H=
6, A= 111 Total=666
HRU – RA – HA
211 + 201 + 6 = 418
666= Stele of Revealing – (52+666+
718) [exhibit number]
Beats 666 = sun symbol (Sol) = ANKH –
F – N – KHONSU – T = Nuteru,
(NVThIRV), THERION, TO MEGA THERION,
KAMURET etc. (20)
Tuesday 26th April. LBR. 02.58 a.m. Invoke Pentagram of Earth and assume the
God form of Set fighting, the sign of the earth grade. I Invoked Set and used
an Earth elemental sign as my Tatwa which rose from the Mulhadara into Daath
and I repeated the invocation. I used the sign of the enterer (Horus) and of
silence (Hoor-Par-Kraat). Tatwa in Ajna, very good; I deliberately left the
mantra A.M.P.H. from the ceremony. I used the square earth Tatwa and placed the
earth element sign into it. On the threshold of astral eyes opening once more!
Colour: Blue flecked with gold.
09.05 a.m. invocation of the Pentagram and the Hexagram – 09.14 a.m.
Pranayama: 09.22 a.m. 15/10/20 cycle. This began quite easy, but became
difficult. Stomach empty!
Wednesday 27th April. LBR. 02.40 a.m. Water Tatwa, crescent in Ajna,
mirrored like rippling water – taste it; smell it; feel it; hear it and flood
my consciousness with it and ‘become it’!
Friday 29th April. LBR. I read through ‘Master of the Temple’ in Equinox III
from 5.20-6.00 p.m.
Saturday 30th April. LBR. 03.30 a.m. Asana: Thunderbolt position. Mantra:
A.M.P.H. (I experimented using the mantra as an active and passive form that is
aloud and silently inward). I ended at 03.55 a.m. I became conscious of a bell
sound, a tinkling in my left ear but it is possible I imagined this. Duration:
25 minutes.
08.30 a.m. Pranayama: Puraka= 10, Khumbhaka= 10, Rechaka= 10, Khumbhaka= 10
(10/10/10/10 cycle). Asana: Thunderbolt. I found this extremely difficult and
had to give up after just five minutes! I remained in my asana and did
pranayama: 5/5/20 cycle. This was much easier to do. I ended at 09.05 a.m.
Stomach empty and pingala quite blocked. Limbs very numb after asana. Duration:
Asana= (Thunderbolt) 35 minutes; Pranayama (5/5/20 cycle) = 30 minutes.
After asana I wrote this verse which seemed to flood my consciousness:
On the banks of sunless shores,
Stood alone, as man adores
Her beauty, as yet unseen, as yet untouched.
To lure the foolish to their doom
In her manifold, gaping womb;
Enticing every plume
And seedling, smutched!
As each whispered air would roll
To find her playful aureole
And her wet lips that trembled, kissed the dew.
As the river’s gentle spray,
Jetted up to greet the day;
At her feet each drop would lay
And die, but O, soon born anew!
And she turned to face the dawn
As each mighty sword was drawn
Against the ever-flowing, foaming stream;
That kissed, O beautiful Princess,
In all thy nakedness:
How art thou loveliness
To sapphire eyes that dream!
AINSA – AIN SOPH AUR (21)
Nosce Te Ipsum – Know Thyself
ASNIA – the Adept.
5= the Pentagram
6= the Hexagram
5= the squaring of the circle by
ALHIM. (22)
The beginning of the Great Work.
The sphere of Mars – Strength
Horus – the sword or the scourge.
6 = 5 grade – Adeptus Major.
AGLA ALHIM
GEBURAH – (motion)
6= Macrocosm and microcosm
interlaced.
The end of the Great Work. (Ruach).
(23)
The sphere of Sol – Beauty
RA (ASAR) – the Lamen or Rosy Cross.
5 = 6 grade – Adeptus Minor.
ABRAHADABRA IAO INRI
Tiphareth – (the point).
11= Magical number – 5+6 AUD (Light).
The magic force. (hot and moist).
NU (MOUT) – The dagger.
Yetzirah – the Formative World –
VITRIOL. (24)
56= NU 65= Adonai (H.G.A.)
Wednesday 4th May. LBR. 02.50 a.m. Invocation of Air Pentagram in the T
(Temple). Assumed God-form of Shu – ‘Thee I invoke...’ etc; Mantra: A.M.P.H.
Air symbol in Ajna. I remember that I gazed upon my breast and saw the workings
of the heart; how fragile it seemed. I fear I have gone wrong somewhere in my
invocation or I am still among the sandy dunes! 08.40 a.m. Invocation of 6 and
5 (Hexagram and Pentagram). Asana: Thunderbolt, (09.00 a.m.) Mantra: A.M.P.H.
till 10.00 a.m. duration: one hour. My arms felt terribly cold; stomach empty.
Extreme pain in both legs at the end! At 09.45 a.m. I went through a stage of
complete revulsion for what I was doing – ‘is it all worth the bother? I’m a
fool!’etc. I took them for the dog-faced demons that they are, trying to tempt
me from the chosen act, and they soon passed.
Thursday 5th May. LBR. 02.43 a.m. Spirit Tatwa. Mantra: A.M.P.H. the black
egg was large and it lay before me. I passed into it using the sign of the
enterer (Horus). A good transference of earth to spirit!
Friday 6th may. LBR. 08.40 a.m. Pranayama: 12/24 cycle (no Khumbhaka). I
managed to do nine minutes till 08.49 a.m. I had headache and Ida and Pingala
are still blocked; Pingala in quite a terrible state! Stomach empty; reading
Equinox vol I (ix) the Evocation of Bartzabel.
Saturday 7th May. LBR. 02.25 a.m. R.C. (Rosy Cross) in Ajna. Quite good.
Raining, thus I saw how the rain nourishes the rose; I heard the rain in my
ears and smelt the rain through the open window. Breathing good! At 03.35 a.m.
I entered a light conscious state, as I was continuing with R.C. in Ajna [I
found this occurs also with my mantra and LBR, Pent and Hex]. I had a
terrifying experience. It was dark with flashing images and fear grew with each
image. I had to break from the work and have a drink of water at 03.35 a.m. I
continued with R.C. in Ajna (still raining). Not sure if R.C. is continuous
through sleep or I suddenly remember it on waking – latter more probable.
Sunday 8th May. LBR. 02.33 a.m. R.C. in Ajna. Mantra: A.M.P.H. I counted two
breaks (strange dreams about entering an old mansion house and another about a
shop where I clumsily knocked everything over). 08.30 a.m. in light state, I
saw an image of a child (more like a baby). He had no eyes and his head was
bandaged. He had dark slits where his eyes should be. His arms were
outstretched in the sign of the cross [Osiris slain]. I kept the image
perfectly. I looked away twice because I found it hideous and grotesque!
08.44 a.m. I continued with R.C. in Ajna (difficult to hold), possibly due
to excitement of dreams. Reading ‘Nature of the Beast’ in evening.
Tuesday 10th May. LBR. Wonder, O wonder, if I could see a speck of your
light in my destiny! 02.30 a.m. Asana: Legs crossed, hands on thighs as in the
Dragon; back rigid. R.C. in Ajna. Mantra: A.M.P.H. [done as active and passive
etc: 5 minutes active/audible, 5 minutes passive/inwardly and 5 minutes
silence, then 5 minutes passive to form a Tetragrammaton: Active –
Ra-Hoor-Khuit; Passive – Hoor-Paar-Kraat (also silence); Nought of Nuit –
Active/Passive= Heru-Ra-Ha – the twin forms of Horus; Nothing= Nuit]. A few
breaks of the usual type. Breathing good! My hands began to vibrate as if they
were electric, and suddenly disappeared completely, followed by my feet! I had
the distinct impression that my hands and feet were crossed upon my feet, which
is physically ridiculous, and that my right hand rested on my left thigh, and
left hand on my right thigh (opposite to their actual position). The head had a
tendency to fall forwards causing a slight giddiness. I rose in my asana and
entered the Temple, standing between the pillars of Severity and Mercy. I was
unable to remain still, I was being drawn upwards and sideways (no matter how
hard I resisted). I went sideways about three feet above the ground and felt as
if my eyes had opened inwardly and I could see faint images in the room. My
physical eyes were definitely closed! This happened two or three times. Also
the R.C. grew in size and I was standing at its foot (this was before I entered
the Temple). I can remember opening my eyes and feeling separate from my
physical body, as if I were a small insect upon some piece of furniture in a
darkened room, in a darkened house etc. My breath increased and I forced the
air between my lips causing a slight loss of consciousness. I ended at 03.25
a.m. R.C. in Ajna into sleep. Duration: Asana + R.C. = 55 minutes.
Wednesday 11th May. LBR. Asana: Legs crossed, hands on thighs. 02.30 a.m.
mantra: A.M.P.H. Excellent, no mistakes. I increased the speed of the mantra.
My lips were dry and numb. I did a test and placed the Water symbol Tatwa in my
Ajna and it was unmovable! Very strong! I kept it in place for a few minutes
with no breaks whatsoever and removed it completely. I then concentrated on the
mantra which was better than ever before for its rhythm. Breath was slow and
steady and the mantra fast. I ended the mantra at 02.45 a.m. and began
Pranayama: 10/10/20 cycle. The first two or three cycles were very easy to do but
then the spasms began; I had to use the whole of my chest and stomach to get
air in and out! On the edge of consciousness with no fear of falling into the
abyss! I ended pranayama at 02.58 a.m. Thought examination: two breaks of a
personal nature; a floating sensation in asana, but instead of travelling to a
desired location – I brought the destination to me! My upper body trembled with
cold sensations. There was an actual ecstasy in the mantra and I experimented
with hyper-ventilating, breathing rapidly and expelling air forcibly between
the lips, in one minute cycles. I became disorientated and white light flooded
my closed eyes. I heard a sound in my ears (not Nada), a whooshing sound, like
crashing waves which I concentrated on. Trembling with cold and the white light
faded; I tried to retrieve it, but in vain. I ended the practice at 03.30 a.m.
Duration: Asana: 1 hour
Mantra: 15 minutes
Pranayama: 13 minutes
Examination: 32 minutes
Thursday 12th May. LBR. 02.27 a.m. R.C. in Ajna – no good: confusion,
jumbled images!
Friday 13th May. LBR. My head is filled with initiation. Preparing to
undertake the O=O ceremony. I read the various stations etc for its performance
from 3.10-4.10 p.m. At 5.40 p.m. ‘Outside, under the sun, in the wind – I
looked up and it all became clearer; it flashed upon me: the eye in the void –
I gazed upon the splendour of the Lady of the Stars and was embraced by her!
Certain things became clear concerning the Magical Universe: Nuit, Hadit,
Ra-Hoor-Khuit (Heru-Ra-Ha)... as it was written on Tuesday 19th April: ‘Yea!
Tremble, wither and wake!’ I am armed and have been granted by the arched
splendour of Nu – my devotion has been rewarded in my dedication towards O=O!
5.45-7.00 p.m. G.D. [Golden Dawn] Z1 document: stations and God forms. I
prepared some diagrams to work with showing the stations and the ‘invisible’
stations.
Left wrist: a circle has appeared on my left wrist (and on my right but to a
lesser degree); I noticed it a week ago and there is an outer ring and an inner
ring which is strange, about the size of a two pence coin and both wrists
are exactly the same! It is as if the stigmata of O=O is somehow upon me. Both
rings are inflamed as if I have been branded!
Saturday 14th May. LBR. 02.50 a.m. Asana: Legs crossed, hands on Yesod –
R.C. = Tiphareth (this seems easier than Ajna). Mantra: A.M.P.H. I ended both
at 03.15 a.m. and concentrated on No-Thing! I immediately saw a golden glow,
with a female figure: golden with wings and gold flowing hair. She ran towards
me, brilliant and bright. She then became two figures (unity becoming duality)
and they were kissing [male and female]; then I glimpsed the perimeter of a
vast city and the sky was a radiant blue. The city had golden walls around it
and it stood at the top of a sheer cliff face. The buildings had wooden window
shutters. I felt that this was a very holy city indeed. Then I saw a golden orb
(Tiphareth). I ended the asana and practice at 03.35 a.m. Duration: 45 minutes.
11.10 a.m. – Eucharistos!
2.30-4.00 p.m. Equinox I (ii) O=O Ritual and G.D. Temple diagrams etc,
stations, wands, lamens, paths etc.
9.45-10.35 p.m. Asana: My Pan position. Reading Eliphas Levi’s ‘The Key of
the Mysteries’. Asana duration: 50 minutes.
I decided upon a new magical name for the O=O [P.A.A.A.]. The word or name
ASNIA is more than the physical, it is the spiritual and it relates to the work
concerning 418 as opposed to 93, which these records have mostly dealt with.
ASNIA is more an expression towards the H.G.A.; a symbolic formula between the earth
and the spirit.
Above the gemmed azure is
The naked splendour of Nuit;
She bends in ecstasy to kiss
The secret ardours of Hadit.
The winged globe, the starry blue,
Are mine, O Ankh-af-na-Khonsu! (25)
The oath: I, __________________, N.T.I. (26), a probationer of the Universal
Brotherhood do this day spiritually bind myself,
By the power of the sword of
vengeance;
By the power of the elements;
By the power of the cross of
suffering!
That I will devote myself to the Great Work and the attainment of the
knowledge and conversation of mine Holy Guardian Angel, and to conform to the
powers of:
Life
Love
Light
Liberty
Silence.
The wand that createth;
The cup that preserveth;
The dagger that destroyeth;
The pentacle that redeemeth!
To accept the Book of the Law as the true word of the Aeon of Horus, and
its scribe, the Priest of the Princes, Ankh-af-na-Khonsu – To Mega Therion, as
the logos of the Law of Thelema!
Do what thou wilt shall be the
whole of the law
Scire – Audere – Velle – Tacere (27)
Love is the Law, Love under will.
Notes:
1. Eucharist: In Thelema the Eucharist is the Cake of Light [see The Book of
the Law and Liber XLIV the Ritual known as the Mass of the Phoenix]. See also
Magick: Of the Eucharist, p 285.
2. IAO. See Magick, part III: ‘The Formula Of IAO’.
3. Sushumna: the central nadi which runs from the base of the spine and up
to the brain, through the chakras.
4. Choronzon: a demon of the Abyss; the spirit of dispersion whose number is
333. See Liber CCCCXVIII (418) The Vision and the Voice: 10th aethyr.
5. Tiphareth: The sixth Sephira on the middle pillar of the Tree of Life,
the Pillar of Mildness, Tiphareth is harmony and beauty and its planet is the
sun.
6. LAYLAH. See Liber CCCXXX111 The Book of Lies, Falsely So Called: Chapter
77 [LAYLAH= 30+1+10+30+1+5=77].
7. Solar plexus: situated at the point of the navel – the Manipura
(Sanskrit) chakra.
8. A.T.S.A. mantra (Sanskrit): ‘Aum Tat Sat Aum’. See Magick, part I.
9. Therion: Greek for ‘Beast’: Aleister Crowley (To Mega Therion: the Great
Beast); Nuit: the sky Goddess who is infinite, also Nu and Nuith (see chapter
one of The Book of the Law), Babalon: the female counterpart of Therion (the
Scarlet Woman), Hadit: also Had, the point or the centre and the masculine
counterpart of Nuit (see the second chapter of the Book of the Law).
10. Ajna (Sanskrit): the third eye chakra.
11. Mulhadara (Sanskrit): base or root chakra.
12. XC vernal equinox (90th year since 1904).
13. Svadisthana (Sanskrit); the sacral chakra – Yesod.
14. Tetragrammaton. See Magick, part III: ‘The Formula of Tetragrammaton’.
15. Daath: not technically a Sephira.
16. Yetzirah: One of the four worlds in the Kabbalistic Tree of Life
[Atziluth, Briah, Yetzirah and Assiah]; Yetzirah is the world of Formation.
17. LVX signs. See magick, part III: plate 3 ‘The Signs of the Grades’.
18. Shu: a deity of ancient Egypt associated with the element of Air.
46. Auromoth, the Water Goddess.
19. Kamuret: The father of Parzival in the story by Wolfram von Eschenbach
and also a Gnostic Saint (its numerical value is 666) in the Ecclesiae
Gnosticae Catholicae Canon Missae. See Liber XV.
20. Ain Soph Aur. See Magick, part III: ‘The Magical Theory of the
Universe’.
21. Alhim. See Magick, part III: ‘The Formula of Alhim, and that of Alim’.
22. Ruach: ‘This may be translated Mind, Spirit, or Intellect: none of these
is satisfactory, the connotation varying with every writer. The Ruach is a
closely-knitted group of Five Moral and Intellectual principles, concentrated
on their core, Tiphareth, the Principle of Harmony, the Human Consciousness and
Will of which the four other Sephiroth are (so to speak) the feelers. And these
five principles culminate in a sixth, Daäth, Knowledge. But this is not really
a principle; it contains in itself the germ of self-contradiction and so of
self-destruction. It is a false principle: for. as soon as Knowledge is
analysed, it breaks up into the irrational dust of the Abyss.’ [Little Essays
Towards Truth: Man, by Aleister Crowley].
23. VITRIOL: Visita Interiora Terrae, Rectificando Invenies Occultum Lapidem
[visit the interior parts of the earth; by rectification thou shalt find the
hidden stone!] The stone is the True Self which can only be found by searching
inwards. There is also an IX Degree OTO reference: Vir Introit Tumulum Regis,
Invenit Oleum Lucis. The Philosopher’s Stone: a) Sulphur (fire) male, active,
energy, desire, the soul; b) Salt (water) female, passive, the body; c)
Philosophical Mercury (air) flux, bisexual, intelligence, the spirit. In
Hebrew, relatively: Shin, Mem and Aleph, the three Mother Letters; and in the
Hindu system of the three Gunas: Rajas, Tamas and Sattvas. See Magick, part
III.
24. Ankh-af-na-Khonsu: a Priest of Thebes during the 26th Dynasty of Egypt.
His Stele which Crowley and his wife Rose were led to in the Boulak Museum,
Cairo in 1904, is regarded as an important artefact in Thelema. The ‘Stele of
Revealing’ as it is known, depicts the Divine Thelemic triumvirate: Nuit the
Goddes, her body arched and her feet and hands touching the earth. The Winged
Globe is below her which is the solar Horus (Hadit). Below this is
Ankh-af-na-Khonsu, the Priest before an enthroned Horus in the form of the
warrior hawk-headed God Ra-Hoor-Khuit. Horus, the God of the New Aeon is the
son of Isis and Osiris and he avenged the murder of his father by slaying the
serpent of the Nile: Set or Typhon! Hoor-Par-Kraat is Horus in the form of the
Lord of Silence (Greek: Harpocrates). Crowley believed himself to be an incarnation
of Ankh-af-na-Khonsu.
25. Nosce Te Ipsum – (Latin) Know Thyself – the motto of the Probationer.
26. The 4 powers of the sphinx: to know (air) to dare (water) to will (fire)
to keep silent (earth); there is also a fifth power which forms the pentagram:
Ire ‘to go’ (spirit).
Love is the Law, love under will.
THE MAGIC BOOK WORM
REVIEWS BY BARRY VAN-ASTEN
The Book Of The Sacred Magic Of Abramelin The Mage - by S. L. Macgregor Mathers.
The Book of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage is one of the most important grimoires in occult literature and anyone familiar with the works of Aleister Crowley will be aware of its significance to Thelema and Magick. Originally written in Hebrew in 1458 by Abraham and addressed to his son Lamech, it was translated from a French manuscript by none other than the founder of the Golden Dawn, S. L. Macgregor Mathers. The volume is divided into three books describing the process of the sacred magic whereby six months of intense purifications, prayer and devotion are undertaken. Once the aspirant has attained to the Knowledge and Conversation of his/her Holy Guardian Angel (the higher self), only then can the angels and infernal spirits be evoked and the talismans used to produce the desired results.
Mathers believed in the malevolent forces to such an extent that he advised caution 'against the dangerous automatic nature of certain of the Magical Squares of the Third Book; for, if left carelessly about, they are very liable to obsess sensitive persons, children and animals'. He also went as far as to say that even owning the book could bring about serious disturbances and even harm to the individual. Crowley says in his 'Confessions' that 'the demons connected with Abra-Melin do not wait to be evoked, they come unsought'. I can't confirm this, but I can't deny it either, and for some who are not serious students of the occult and believe it to be just 'harmless twaddle' (fou pauvre!), it can lead to very real unspeakable torment and therefore it should not be underestimated. This is dark and dangerous stuff indeed!
The Magical Dilemma Of Victor Neuburg - by Jean Overton Fuller.
This excellent biography of Victor Benjamin Neuburg (1883-1940) is a heartfelt and humane study of a man. We find him at Trinity College, Cambridge in 1906 and his ventures in poetry lead to his first publication 'The Green Garland' (1908). He encounters the poet and occultist Aleister Crowley and enters his magical circle of friends. The young Victor must have felt flattered to have the attention and poetic encouragement from such a notorious and charismatic character as Crowley. In fact, he showed great promise as a poet and his second book 'The Triumph Of Pan' (1910) alludes to his spiritual development and hints at his feelings for his lover, the 'sweet wizard' - Aleister Crowley, who initiated Neuburg into his system of magick.
In 1909, Victor (Frater Omnia Vincam) underwent a Magical Retirement at Crowley's home, Boleskine House on the shore of Loch Ness in Scotland and suffered much hardship. The following year he danced for his 'master' in the 'Rites Of Eleusis', Crowley's staged performances of magical invocations; we also see Victor assisting Crowley with his work on The Equinox and in the Paris Working of 1914, where the two lovers invoked dark forces by the use of homosexual magic.
This is probably the greatest book we are likely to see on Neuburg and Jean Overton Fuller has done a first rate job! But it is a pity Victor never revealed the true intimate nature of his relationship with the Great Beast, for he must have truly admired and loved the man to be so damaged beyond repair when their magical partnership soured and it is said, Crowley ritually cursed him. And so Neuburg remained strangely silent on his association with Crowley - what really happened in the desert when they conjured the demon Choronzon?
Whatever the truth is, it affected the rest of his life and he was always looking over his shoulder for the shadow of the Beast. But he did have the vision to recognise the poetic talent of Dylan Thomas while he was poetry editor for the Sunday Referee. We get as close as we are ever going to get with this book and for all those demonic rites with the Beast and all those secrets he took with him to the grave, 'Vicky' seems like a thoroughly gentle, kind and lovely man to have known! Astonishing!
Aleister Crowley The Black Magician - by C. R. Cammell.
This little book is essentially a re-working of Cammell's 'Aleister Crowley, the Man: the Mage: the Poet' (1951) which presents a personal and intimate portrait of the Great Beast whom Cammell came to know between 1936 and 1941. Cammell didn't find it difficult to resist Crowley's magical persona with his rites and notions concerning the Book of the Law and the Aeon of Horus, but Cammell did fall under the spell of Crowley the man and the poet; of Crowley the man of great intellect and legendary wit who was generous to close friends, of whom there were few.
Within these delightful pages (22 concise chapters) a picture appears, not of the sensational 'wickedest man in the world' and all the nonsense surrounding his mystique, but of the Logos of Thelema as a wise old man of the world still capable of great gestures despite the bad press against him and his financial misfortunes; a man in whose refined and charming company a vast and peculiar genius shined but never so much as to appear pretentious or bombastic.
The Black Magician is a companion piece to other published biographies and C. R. Cammell has captured in this touching and honest account, a glimmer of the essence of the man Aleister Crowley that will stand alongside other great monoliths of the Crowley canon.
The Drug And Other Stories - by Aleister Crowley.
Those who are new to the writings of Aleister Crowley may be pleasantly surprised by this wonderful collection of forty-two short stories, some of which have never been published before. Most of Crowley's fiction was written between 1908 and 1922 and appeared in such periodicals as 'The Equinox', 'The English Review' and 'The International', to name a few.
Throughout many of the stories we are aware of the astonishing intellect behind them and we are never far away from the man's celebrated wit and dark humour; there are also elements of intense foreboding and unease. In fact, in my opinion, Crowley is a very accomplished writer and given time to mature, his name could have sat alongside the greats of the novel and the short story, if his way had not been obscured by notoriety. But a deeper understanding and appreciation of the man is possible through his fiction, and such stories as: 'At the fork of the roads', 'The violinist', 'The vixen', 'The ordeal of Ida Pendragon', 'The stratagem', 'A death-bed repentance' and 'The argument that took the wrong turning' have auto-biographical details woven into the fabric of his fiction.
Those more familiar with Crowley's works will recognise the philosophical, magical and religious references that appear, but these stories can simply be enjoyed by all who love the art of story-telling. There are still many works by Crowley yet to be published but perhaps with this renewed interest in the man this will be rectified in the future! With an extensive section on notes at the end of the book, this collection is a long-awaited delight!
The Great Beast: The Life And Magick Of Aleister Crowley - by John Symonds.
First published in 1951, The Great Beast signalled an interest in the occultist Aleister Crowley (1875-1947), bringing his magick and his reputation to a wider audience; it also influenced some of the greatest musicians from the sixties to the present day with its doctrine of Do What Thou Wilt.
Unfortunately, John Symonds (1914-2006) has been criticized over the years for pandering to the public taste for startling revelations and strengthening the image of Crowley as the 'wickedest man in the world'. Although there are elements of sensationalism, I would disagree on the whole and say that The Great Beast is a milestone in Crowley related publications and set a high standard for biography making it an essential part of any collection.
The Great Beast also combines Symonds' later work 'The Magick of Aleister Crowley'. This is a classic and memorable study of one of the world's great enigmas: Aleister Crowley, and a book you will keep coming back to!
PEGAMINA
By BARRY VAN-ASTEN
PART TWO
THE STORY OF THE PRIESTESS AND THE MAGICIAN
It was a day for adventure and Pegamina was out walking by herself. The birds were singing high in the trees and the sun shone down upon her, making her feel all warm and tingly. ‘Nothing could be more beautiful!’ she thought, as the gentle breeze seemed to whisper all around her: ‘you are so very loved Peg... you are so loved!’
After crossing the little stream and walking by the edge of the wood, she noticed a small boy, standing all alone and crying. He was such an unusual little thing with his curly brown hair that seemed to be everywhere and nowhere in particular at the same time. And as she got closer she could see his large black eyes, which would probably have seemed much darker had his face not been so dirty! ‘Are you lost?’ asked Peg.
‘No, I know where I am, thank you’ he replied.
‘Then why are you crying?’
‘Because they’re broken!’ he sobbed.
‘What’s broken?’ said Peg, looking around but seeing nothing.
‘My wings!’ And the small boy handed Pegamina his broken wings that had been poorly made from leaves and twigs.
‘They are in need of some help aren’t they?’
‘Can you help them?’ said the little tearful boy.
‘I don’t know, but I’ll try’. And Pegamina fastened the leaves and twigs back together as best she could, saying ‘I don’t think you’ll ever fly again!’
‘Oh it doesn’t matter, flying is very tiring, isn’t it?’ and he smiled such a beautiful smile.
‘Who are you?’ asked peg.
‘My name’s Wot Not, what’s yours?’
‘Pegamina. Is Wot Not your real name, or is it short for something?’
‘Oh it’s very real and I think it’s long for nothing!’
And so, Pegamina and Wot Not became quite friendly as they walked beside the little stream together; she, taking his small hand in hers and thinking how nice it would be if she had a little brother to take care of. They talked and they talked, about lots of things, things they had done and things they had seen.
‘You know’ said Wot Not, ‘when I get a headache, the only colour I can look at is green, it seems to make the pain go away. Strange isn’t it? I wonder if animals get headaches... maybe not, with so many green things to look at’. And they both lay down in the long grass and gazed at the sky. ‘I wonder what a mirror does’ said Wot Not, ‘when no one is there to look into it? And how does it know?’
‘What silly things you say!’ laughed Pegamina. Just then, Wot Not stood up and shouted: ‘Angel cake! Angel cake!’
‘What are you doing?’ asked Peg.
‘I’m calling my sister, she’s a grown up!’ he said, twisting his mouth as if the words ‘grown up’ tasted very sour.
‘Is she really called Angel cake?’ Peg said with some surprise.
‘Oh yes! Angel cake! Angel cake!’ he called again. And as if from nowhere appeared a tall, beautiful girl with long brown hair and the same large dark eyes as Wot Not, walking towards them; as she got closer, Pegamina gazed upon her beautiful face and then at her dress, which was long and flowing and had been torn in many places and carelessly stitched back together again. And Pegamina couldn’t help but stare at her feet, for she was barefooted. ‘Perhaps she really is an angel’ thought Peg.
‘Where have you been and what’s happened to your wings?’ said the angel in the torn dress and bare feet.
‘Oh they got broken but my friend here tried to mend them’. And Pegamina introduced herself. ‘I’m Pegamina and I’m pleased to meet you. Is your name really Angel cake?’
‘Oh no, it’s Angelica but Wot Not can’t pronounce it properly’. And the three of them sat down together in the long and waving grass. Angelica was somewhat older than Peg and clearly not one of those sour tasting adults yet there was something about her which seemed to suggest she had not lost all of her child-like ways.
‘Tell us a story Angel!’ cried Wot Not.
‘Would you like to hear a story Pegamina?’ Angelica asked.
‘Oh yes please, if you would?’
‘Now, let me see, ah, yes’. And she proceeded to relate the story of the priestess and the Magician:
‘Long ago, there was a beautiful Priestess named Selemia, the daughter of King Ursalom, who ruled in the Kingdom of Sleepy Sadness. Selemia was so beautiful that all the Princes came from near and far to admire her beauty, but Selemia loved only one man and his name was Per Baugd, the woodcutter’s son. All the young maidens in the village fell in love with Per Baugd, for he was such a strong and handsome man, and he knew it most of all, for he would break hearts as easily as he cut down trees with his axe. But Selemia could think of nothing and no one but Per Baugd. She did not care that he was so poor, because she loved him for his handsome face and his broad shoulders. Per Baugd knew that the Priestess was in love with him and he enjoyed treating her as if she was nothing at all; as if she were just another tree in a large forest that eventually would come down. But Selemia loved him all the more, and oh how her heart ached.
One day, Selemia went to the magician and told him of her sad aching heart and asked if anything could be done.
‘You have fallen in love with a man who can love no one but himself’ said Magar the King’s Magician, ‘and there is nothing I can do to change such a man, for vanity is greater than any magic. But there is one thing I can do, I can change your own heart and the desire within that you have for this man’. And Selemia agreed, for she could not bear the pain of loving a man who could never return that love. And so the Magician mixed his potions and cast his spells, saying ‘you must hide yourself away for a week and a day, letting no eyes fall upon your beautiful face. And when the white swan sings three times, the first thing that you see on opening your eyes shall be the love of your heart and the love of your life!’
Well, a week and a day pass by and Selemia, still with her eyes tightly closed, waits for the white swan to sing. All day she waits until eventually she hears the sad and lonely song, three times. But she was afraid to open her eyes for she did not want to give her love away too carelessly. And so she waits and thinks very hard and very long.
Time passes and still she could not bring herself to open her eyes. Then, she hears the sound of sleigh bells and she knows it is Trypthelda and his reindeer, Minska, pulling his sleigh full of furs and silks over the snow on his way to market. ‘Yes, Trypthelda is a kind man. I could love a man like him’ she thought. And she opened the door of the little cottage where she had been hiding away for a week and a day and she opened her eyes. But it was not Trypthelda that she saw, or Minska, his reindeer, for there before her, pulling the sleigh that he had stolen, was Orlon, the monstrous, hideous and mute hunchback. Of course, Selemia fell deeply in love with Orlon, for she could not see his repulsive face or his hunchback, she only saw the love of her heart and the love of her life. And she went to him and kissed his twisted face as he grunted with happiness. And she took his rough, bleeding hands and led him into the sleigh, covering him in furs and silks to keep him warm. And she pulled the sleigh herself, while Orlon lay fast asleep upon it. She pulled him everywhere, and although he could not speak, she knew that Orlon loved her more than any man, and could give her more love than anyone as vain as Per Baugd.
Over the snow, over the snow,
The Priestess and her sleigh would go.
Years passed and the Priestess and Orlon grew very old together. Yet still she pulled the sleigh. Eventually, poor sick Orlon died, but Selemia, never hearing him ever speak a word, never noticed. And still she pulled the sleigh.
Selemia’s beauty faded until it was only a memory and her fine dress had become thin and worn beneath the fur coat that she wore. Her beautiful long blonde hair was now grey and thin too, and all day she would speak to no one, except Orlon, the love of her heart and the love of her life, whom she pulled everywhere in the sleigh. But she did not know that under the furs and under the silks, heaped with snow, her Orlon was dead and dreaming of her now!
Well, when she discovered poor Orlon, her heart broke and she died too and she was found, still clutching at the hunchback’s bones, lying under the furs and under the silks that were heaped with snow, as much in love in death as she had been in love in life!’
‘What a sad story’ said Peg, ‘I thought it was going to have a happy ending?’
‘It was a happy ending’ Angelica said, ‘don’t you see? Per Baugd’s beautiful face disguised his hideous heart just as Orlon’s grotesque face disguised his beautiful heart. In the end it didn’t really matter. Selemia was beautiful and the hunchback was ugly, but when they became old, they both grew uglier anyway, except Selemia had further to grow in ugliness than him!’
‘But Orlon couldn’t have been very nice if he stole the sleigh!’ said Wot Not.
‘It’s not surprising when someone who has been treated like a monster that they should begin to act like one too!’ said Angelica.
‘Yes, but Selemia had to use magic didn’t she?’
‘And doesn’t that tell you something?’ Angelica said as she looked more and more like an angel. And Pegamina closed her eyes and thought about it for quite some time until she opened them and found herself sitting all alone. She called out ‘Wot Not!’ Angelica!’ but there was no answer. And she saw the broken wings upon the grass and held them. She knew that something was different and changed; she felt it in her heart!
Over the snow, over the snow,
The Priestess and her sleigh would go
