The Urn

Preface ^[1]

This is the sequel to “The Temple of Solomon the King,”^[2] and is the Diary of a Magus. The book contains a detailed account ofall the experiences passed through by the Master Therion in his attainment of this grade of Initiation, the highest possible to any manifested Man.

Introduction ^[3]

In "The Vision and the Voice", the attainment of the grade of Master of the Temple was symbolized by the adept pouring every drop of his blood, that is his whole individual life, into the Cup of the Scarlet Woman, who represents Universal Impersonal Life. There remains therefore (to pursue the imagery) of the adept “nothing but a little pile of dust.” In a subsequent vision the Grade of Magus is foreshadowed; and the figure is that this dust is burnt into “a white ash,” which ash is preserved in an Urn. It is difficult to convey the appropriateness of this symbolism, but the general idea is that the earthly or receptive part of the Master is destroyed. That which remains has passed through fire; and is therefore, in a sense, of the nature of fire. The Urn is engraved with a word or symbol expressive of the nature of the being whose ash is therein. The Magus is thus, of course, not a person in any ordinary sense; he represents a certain nature or idea. To put it otherwise, we may say, the Magus is a word. He is the Logos of the Æon which he brings to pass.^[4]

The above is obscure. I perceived and deplore the fact. The idea may be more intelligible, examined in the light of history. Gautama Buddha was a Magus. His word was Anatta; that is, the whole of his system, which revolutionized the thought of Asia, may be considered as based upon and consecrated in that one word, which is his denial of the existence of the Atman or “soul” of Hindu philosophy.

Later, Mohammed also partially overturned an age by uttering his word, Allah. But to us, practically, the most important case of the kind is that connected with such “gods” as Dionysus, Osiris, Baldur, Marsyas, Adonis, Jesus, and other deifications of the unknown Magus concerned. The old pagan worship of the Mother-idea was superseded by the word IAO or its equivalents, which asserted the formula of the Dying God, and made the Male, dying to himself in the act of love, the engineer of the continued life of the race. This revolution cut at the root of all previous custom. Matriarchy vanished; self-sacrifice became the cardinal virtue, and so through infinite ramifications.

This idea of accomplishing the Great Work by a voluntary death was bound up with the belief that the sun died, and was reborn with the hours and the seasons. Astronomy having exploded this fiction, mankind was ready to gain a further comprehension of its own parallel case.

My own word, Thelema, supplies a new and scientifically sound basis for ethics. Self-sacrifice is a romantic folly; death does not end life; it is a temporary phase of life as night and winter are of terrestrial activity. Many other conceptions are implied in this word, Thelema. In particular, each individual is conceived as the centre of his own universe, his essential nature determining his relations with similar beings and his proper course of action. It is obvious that these ideas are revolutionary. Yet to oppose them is to blaspheme science. Already, in a thousand ways, the principles involved have replaced those of the Dying God. Little remains but to accept Thelema consciously as a statement of law, so that any given problem may be solved by applying it to each case. The man Crowley had been chosen to enunciate this Law, that is, to exercise the essential function of a Magus. But he had yet to understand it, a task which involved the crossing of the Abyss, already described; and further, to identify his will with the Law, so that his personality might act as the focus of its energy. Before he could be that pure will whose name is that word, he had to be purged by fire of all competing volitions; and this was done by those who had chosen him during this part of his life, which I am about to record.

He had indeed got rid of his sense of the personal self, yet his force was discharging itself dispersedly through all sorts of channels appropriate to the various elements in his nature. It was necessary to constrain every particle of his energy to move in one sole direction. (The physical analogy of a gas whose electrons are polarized and one not so organized is not so bad.)

It must now be explained how he was able to understand what was happening to him in this initiation — his life from 1914 to 1919. The Grade of Magus is traditionally connected with the idea of the number 2; male creative energy, wisdom and the expression of a single idea in terms of duality. It transmits the idea of the divine unity to its feminine counterpart, the understanding, somewhat as a man transmits the essence of his racial character to his wife so that he perceives his inmost nature, itself unintelligible to him directly, by observing the flowering of that essence in his son. The Hebrew title of the idea embodying these characteristics is Chokmah, whose numerical value is 73. This fact appears arbitrary and irrelevant; but it forms part of the symbolic language in which the præterhuman intelligences who control the initiate communicate with him. Thus, my adventures in America seemed a series of stupidities for a long time. Nothing I did produced the 14 The Equinox expected results. I found myself suddenly switched from one episode to another so irrationally that I began to feel that I had somehow got into a world where causality did not obtain. The mystery only became clear when analysis disclosed that the events which threw me about in this manner occurred at almost exact intervals of 73 days, or of some multiple or sub-multiple thereof. I understood from this that 73 terrestrial days made up a single day of initiation.^[5]

As soon as I had grasped this singular fact, I was able to interpret each such period by considering how its events influenced my spiritual development. In this I succeeded so well that towards the end I became able to predict the sort of thing that would happen to me beforehand, which helped me to meet circumstances intelligently and make the fullest and most appropriate use of them.

One further point with regard to this initiation must be mentioned, though it sounds so fantastic even to myself that I can scarcely smother a smile. In the ancient ceremonies of the Egyptians the candidate was confronted or guided on his journey by priests wearing the masks of various animals, the traditional character of each serving to indicate the function of its wearer. Quaint as it sounds, I found myself discovering an almost stupefying physical resemblance to divers symbolic animals in those individuals whose influence on me, during their appointed period, was paramount.^[6]

From these and other indications I have been able to construct an intellectual image of the initiation; and if these preliminary remarks be thoroughly understood, it should be easy to follow the course of my progress to the Grade of Magus.

Part I^[7]

Notes from the Diary
of the Candidate nemo 8°=3□
during his Initiation to the Grade of Magus.^[8]

THE COLLOQUY OF V.V.V.V.V.
THAT IS TO BE A MAGUS 9° = 2□ OF A∴A∴
WITH THE GOD ΘΩΘ^[9]

New York ☉ in 11° ♑ An. x. ☿ in 9°50' ♑ [New Year’s Eve, 1914–1915 e.v., about midnight CHECK]

This record should touch briefly on the causes of this work.

About Dec. 14 = I came to the conclusion that ☿ was Lord of New York, and began various invocations of him as best I could, notably by the O.T.O. method. I shall refer here, and after, to the record “De Arte Regia”.^[10]

I did also certain Psalms, certain divinations, and have been doing thrice daily the old invocation “Majesty of Godhead” as in “Liber LXIV.”^[11]

Also on going to bed, I have done dharāna on an imagined figure of Hermes now and again; or the Caduceus. I have been exercised with regard to the question of the possibility of my attaining the grade of Magus in this life (after all!) and my very blindness and impotence — which are at present considerable — give me hope. I seem to have no creative power, or inspiration. I don’t work at all; I do geomancy on all sorts of things. It’s funny; I don’t feel bad; but there’s something radically wrong in all I do. Is this the Threshold?

Jan. 2, 1915. = I have just done a IX° to become a great Orator, invoked Tahuti, and delivered a sermon to the inhabitants of the Ten Thousand Worlds on the text “Oh my beautiful God! I swim in Thy heart like a trout in the mountain torrent.”^[12]

Jan. 3. = 10:30 a.m. Inv. ☿. — 2 p.m. Inv. ☿. Tried sermon on CCXX II:59. A hopeless failure; broke down in five minutes. — 9:30 p.m. Inv. ☿.

Jan. 4. = 9:30 a.m. Inv. ☿. — 2:30 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 11:35 p.m. Inv. ☿.

Jan. 5. = 10:30 [a.m. ] Inv. ☿. — 4:30 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 10:15 p.m. Inv. ☿. followed by dharāna on Caduceus, the W[inged] G[lobe] being in the cerebellum, and the staff in the spine. Not very good, and yet near dhyāna. I got a dhyāna, by the way, a spark of silver (left by Hermes, on whose image I was concentrating ere I slept) of extreme brilliance. This seems like the true dhyāna of ☿. This on Jan. 3 rather late at night. I do not seem to have noted that I brought in the new (vulgar) year by the Thoth invocation followed by Enochian calls, and then the Bornless One.^[13]

What about the breaking up of sleep, general “John. St. John”,^[14] act? Perhaps I need some such big work to initiate a true Current of Force in this filthy country?

Jan. 6. = 10 a.m. (approx.) Inv. ☿. — 6:20 p.m. (approx.) Inv. ☿. — 8:40 p.m. (approx.) Inv. ☿. — 11:35 [p.m.] Dharāna on Caduceus till — 12:18 a.m. Practically one long fight against thinking of the pole-axings I have had today. But I won in the end.

Jan. 7. = 11 a.m. Inv. ☿. — 3:45 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 12:20 a.m. — [Jan. 8] Inv. ☿. Today brought me luck. S.K. bought books to $100, and actually paid for them! — 4572 col. 170 W. 72nd.^[15]

Jan. 8. = 10:45 a.m. Inv. ☿. — 2:10 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 9:00 p.m. (approx.) Inv. ☿.

Jan. 9. = 10:45 a.m. Inv. ☿. — 4:00 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 9:15 p.m. Inv. ☿.

Jan. 10. = 10:45 a.m. Inv. ☿. — 1:30 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 11:30 p.m. Inv. ☿.

Jan. 11. = 10:45 a.m. Inv. ☿. — 1:30 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 6:00 p.m. Inv. ☿.

Jan. 12. = 10:45 a.m. Inv. ☿. — 1:30 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 12:30 a.m. (Jan. 13) Inv. ☿.

Jan. 13. = 11:00 a.m. Inv. ☿. — 1:30 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 12:14 a.m. (Jan. 14) Inv. ☿.

Jan. 14. = 10:00. Inv. ☿. — 2:00. Inv. ☿. — 11:20 p.m. Inv. ☿. and performed op[eratio]n recorded in Rex de arte Regia^[10] XXIII.

Jan. 15. = 11:00 [a.m.] Inv. ☿. — 4:00 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 8:20 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 9:12. Op. XXIV. — 11:20–12:10. Med. [??] with mantra Iczodhehca^[16] to aid that Op. XXIV. This, too, to go to sleep.

Jan. 16. = 10:35. Inv. ☿. — 6:00. Inv. ☿. — 12:50 a.m. (17th) Inv. ☿.

Jan. 17. = 11:50 a.m. Inv. ☿. — 3:10 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 12:20 a.m. (18th) Inv. ☿. and a little fervent prayer.

Jan. 18. = 10:30. Inv. ☿. — 1:20 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 10:45 p.m. Inv. ☿.

Jan. 19. = 10:30. Inv. ☿. — 5:10 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 9:00 p.m. Inv. ☿.

Jan. 20. = 9:20 a.m. (approx.) Inv. ☿. — 8:40 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 11:10 p.m. Inv. ☿.

Jan. 21. = 10:45. Inv. ☿. after L[esser] B[anishing] R[itual] ⛤. — 2:00. Inv. ☿. — 11:55 p.m. Inv. ☿.

Jan. 22. = 10:40. Inv. ☿. after LBR ⛤. — 2:30. Inv. ☿. — 9:20. Inv. ☿. after LBR ⛤.

Jan. 23. = 10:35. LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — 3:20. Inv. ☿. — 8:30. Inv. ☿.

Jan. 24. = 10:50. LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — 2:00. Inv. ☿. — 3:20. Inv. ☿.

Jan. 25. = 10:40 a.m. LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — 5:55 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 11:50 p.m. Inv. ☿.

Jan. 26. = 10:40 a.m. LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — 3:15 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 9:15 p.m. Op. XXVII. — 10:13 p.m. Op. XXVIII. — 10:25 p.m. Inv. ☿.

Jan. 27. = 10:30 a.m. LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — 3:40 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 8:35 p.m. Inv. ☿.

Jan. 28. = 10:40 a.m. LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — 3:27 p.m. Inv. ☿. Came home late and criminally forgot to invoke Mercury.

Jan. 29. = 10:50 a.m. LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — 4:05 p.m. Op. XXIX. — 5:00 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 10:00 p.m. Inv. ☿.

Jan. 30. = 10:55 a.m. LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — 3:47. Op. XXX. — 4:00 Inv. ☿. — 1:15 a.m. 31st. (Home late.)

Jan. 31. = 11:00 LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — 3:35 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 9:20. Inv. ☿.

Feb. 1. = 10:50 a.m. LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — 2:15 p.m. No ☿. Began morphia except night of Jan. 31, with 1/6 gr. Many dreams at first of the annoying type. Afterwards extraordinarily vivid and delightful. — 2:25 p.m. 1 gr. opium. — 9:45 p.m. 1/2 gr. opium. It is evident that I must go from ☿ to ♃. — 10:30 p.m. Inv. ☿. and IAW. Mantra for solitary IX° work with Juppiter:

Haud secus ac templum spumanti semini vates
Lustrat; dum gaudens accipit amphora aquas;
Sparge, precor, servis hominum rex atque deorum
Juppiter omnipotens, aurea dona, tuis.^[17]

— 11:40. 1/2 gr. opii.

Feb. 2. = 10:30. LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — 3:30. Inv. ☿. 1 gr. opii. — 8:55 p.m. 1 gr. opii. — 8:55 p.m. Inv. ☿. and IAW. — 11:15. 1 gr. op.

Feb. 3. = 10:40. LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — 3:40. Inv. ☿. — 10:05. Inv. ☿. — 11:20. 11/2 gr. opii. — 11:20. Inv. ☿ [and] IAW.

Feb. 4. = 10:35 a.m. LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — 11:40. Inv. ☿. — 3:00. Inv. ☿. — 12:00. 1/2 gr. Morf.^[18] Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 5. = 10:30. LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — 2:00 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 11:40 p.m. Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 6. = 10:55. LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — 3:00. Inv. ☿. — 8:20. Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 7. = 10:50. LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — 4:15. Inv. ☿. — 10:50. Inv. ☿ and IAW. — 10:57. Op. XXXI.

Feb. 8. = 11:50. Inv. ☿. — 4:15. Inv. ☿. — 5:07. Op. XXXII. — 11:20. Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 9. = 11:10. Inv. ☿. — 3:05. Inv. ☿. — 12:15 (Feb. 10) Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 10. = 11:45. Inv. ☿. — 5:55. Inv. ☿. — 10:50. Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 11. = 11:45. Inv. ☿. Afternoon. Things interfered. Mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.^[19] — 5:31. Op. XXXIII. — 11:25. Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 12. = 11:40. Inv. ☿. — 1:00. Inv. ☿. — 12:45 (13th) Inv. ☿ and IAW. (In Body of Light only.)

Feb. 13. = 10:40. Inv. ☿. — 5:50. Inv. ☿. — 8:54 p.m. Op. XXXIV. — 9:30. Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 14. = a.m. in bed after Op. XXXIV and a late supper. — 2:30 p.m. Inv. ☿. — 11:15 p.m. Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 15. = I had gone to sleep praying for a dream to teach me how to fix the volatile.

I was in a room-square, bare in N.Y. where were 4 or 5 men. The eldest showed me the Book of Galeth (I took this to be in the Bible) and read some curious verses with words strange to me. They sang also, and the senior preached, illustrating his speech by a dying lion — a series of statues reminding one of the dying pig toy which I had noticed on the street a day or so before — in each case the lion was to be turned over onto its back. The theme of the sermon was mostly that “He” Christ or lion or elixir or something must be turned completely over, and must be made very dead indeed. The book was full of promises that he would come back, and he — on the whole — is not wanted back.

In Dream 2 I was wandering from a hotel in a desert place into a sort of Eastern City or bazaar. A boy was clinging to me at first; later a girl. I, on the other hand, merely wanted a Turkish bath. The whole town was part of the bath, but I couldn’t find the hot room, and in hunting about I got out again to the sign post where the roads parted just beyond the hotel.

— 10:50. Inv. ☿. I must have dreamt it, but I thought I saw the new moon last night, and she was only 12 hours old. — 4:20. Inv. ☿. — 10:20 about. Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 16. = 10:50 a.m. Inv. ☿. — 2:50. Inv. ☿. — 12:20 a.m. [Feb. 17] Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 17. = 10:50 a.m. Inv. ☿. — 4:05. Inv. ☿. — 11:00. Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 18. = 10:35. Inv. ☿. — 4:15. Inv. ☿. — 12:10 [Feb. 19] Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 19. = 10:30. Inv. ☿. — 5:30. Inv. ☿. — 10:30. Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 20. = At docks all a.m. — 7:05. Inv. ☿. — 10:40. Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 21. = 6:35 a.m. Op. XXXV. — 11:35. Inv. ☿. — 3:25. Inv. ☿. — 12:25 [Feb. 22] Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 22. = 10:15. Inv. ☿. — 5:10. Inv. ☿. — 11:35. Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 23. = 11:00. Inv. ☿. — 4:50. Inv. ☿. — 11:50. Inv. ☿.

Feb. 24. = 11:25. Inv. ☿. — 3:05. Inv. ☿. — 12:00. Inv. ☿ and IAW.

Feb. 25. = 12:30. Inv. ☿. — 2:35. Inv. ☿. — 12:10 [Feb. 26] Too tired. Apologized.

Feb. 26. = 11:39. LBR ⛤. Inv. ☿. — ? Exact hour p.m. — Inv. ☿. — Apologized at night.

Feb. 27. = 10:30. Inv. ☿. — 4:20. Inv. ☿. — 12:10. Inv. ☿ (astral).

Feb. 28. = 12:40. Inv. ☿. — 2:30. Inv. ☿. — 11:45. Inv. ☿.

March 1. = 10:20. Inv. ☿. — 5:40. Inv. ☿. — 12:00. Inv. ☿.

March 2. = 11:00. Inv. ☿. — 2:30. Inv. ☿. Apologized at night.

March 3. = 12:00. Inv. ☿. — 2:30. Inv. ☿. — 8:50. Inv. ☿ and Inv. ê for A.V. with Bro. Cullen.

March 4. = 11:00. LBR ⛤ and Inv. ☿. — 2:55. Op. XXVI. — 7:20. Inv. ☿. — Late at night apologized.

March 5. = 10:25. Inv. ☿. — Out all p.m.

March 6. = 11:20. Inv. ☿. — 4:05. Inv. ☿. — 8:00 p.m. Kundry’s^[20] visions after Inv. ☿.

March 7. = 10:00. Inv. ☿. — ? Very busy; probably did invoke. ☿ once in p.m.

March 8. = a.m. apologized. — 4:15. Inv. ☿. — At night more apologies.

March 9. = 1:05. Inv. ☿. — 4:00. Inv. ☿. — Evening ill.

March 10. = 12:15. Inv. ☿. — This all broke down owing to my having to go away to Philadelphia.

__________________________________

88/8 x (88/8 + 88/8 + 8 + 8) = 418

Part II [fragment] ^[21]

[July 1915 e.v. ].

Result: This is one of the greatest experiences of my life. Curious that the 1906 success also came through a magical thanksgiving under stress of passion. I went off to sleep almost at once. In the morning I woke early, before 7, in an absolutely renewed physical condition. I had the clean fresh feeling of a healthy boyhood, and was alert and active as a kitten — post talem mortem!^[22] Mentally, I woke into Pure Love. This was symbolized as a cube^[23] of blue-white light like a diamond of the best quality. It was lucid, translucent, self-luminous, and yet not radiating forth. I suppose because there was nothing Else in the Cosmos. This very lobe is intransitive; the love has no object. My gross mind vanished; when, later on, memory pictures of Hilarion arose, they were rejected automatically. All the desire — quality, the clinging, the fear, were no more; it was Pure Love without object or attachment. I cannot describe the quality of the emancipation given by this most wonderful experience. Aum.

Part III [fragment] ^[24]

 

Oct. 12 [1915 e.v. ]. = 1:05 a.m.

You have awakened my virility, Hilarion,^[25] to the full; a wonderful and serious event.

I am just come out of a dream. I was supposed to be in the country somewhere proving an alibi, and had stolen up to town for an evening. There were Harré, Raynes [?], somebody I’ve forgotten who lived with Harré, and one or two others. There was you also, but your name was Miss Lelang or Lalaing, and you were a student artist. I think you had gone home early. Anyhow, I too went, not very late, after certain manoeuvres. (? There was some girl there with whom I wanted to be alone, but I can’t remember who, how, or why?)

In any case, I found myself on a grassy hill, which was the west side of the Butte Montmartre, and also a University, and I had to walk round to the south side to get to 56th St. where you lived. For I wished to make a last effort to see you. But I only decided this because I went to sleep “for a moment” on the grass and waking found it was 9:30 a.m. (I wondered why it was so light. The girls were going to market and students to the University and so on.) I had on by this time my blue and gold magic robe, and my C[ambridge] U[niversity] academicals, which I put on over the robe to hide it.

At your home the landlady swore you had gone; but I refused to believe it so silently and so forcefully that she suddenly changed her mind, took me upstairs, and knocked.

You flung the door open. You had a loose nightdress on, and hour hair was down. Your first impulse was to shut the door, but you were afraid (I think) and I have little chance for I came in with determination.

On the bed sad Sidney Carlisle (Doris’ worm husband)^[26] with some thin brown sack-like thing on; under it I could see an enormous F in erection — at least 18 inches long. Behind the door Neuburg, or Lapére, or a mixture of the two, was squatting on the floor.

It was of course evident that you were the last word in horror. I said “All right; I accept the situation, and I’ll show you.” I caught you in my arms, and we began to dance voluptuously, madly, our mouths locked. S.C. used his F as a violin, with some curious object (I can’t remember exactly what) as a bow, while Neuburg chanted a mantra. The dance god madder and faster. Bye and Bye I threw you down tempestuously on the bed B, and thrust my head where it is happiest. Then after awhile I came up and began to make love to you in the usual way.

I woke, finding myself about to end, and believing the dream to be true, I summoned all my strength.

Part III ^[27]

June 28, 1916 e.v. die Mercurii. Adams Cottage, Bristol, N.H.

Last night I dreamt that I was divining in re my grade of 9°=2□, and pulled the Deuce of Diamonds. This was not the ordinary Tarot card, but a regular Deuce, only with the two diamonds linked by a stem. The meaning of this card was that I must gain the most complete indifference to pain, my own or another’s. Else, I suppose, one is bound to a hedonistic outlook.)^[28] I also dreamt, but less vividly, that the four deuces were a complete synthesis of the powers of the grade. This may have been the result of rationalizing the true dream.

June 28. = 7:30 p.m. Took 200 drops Chocolate base preparation Anh. Lew.^[29]

— 10:30 p.m. Awhile ago I had cut down a great tree, whose fork was marvellous like unto the thighs of a Goddess. This I set up upon a stone, and putting another part of the trunk — with a similar but smaller fork — for a Phallus, I did enflame this giant copulation by my magick art. And first the Phallus became as the head of a great serpent, even the eye and ear marked aright, and he visibly taking pleasure in his kisses to that mighty Vulva. Last he fell exhausted, and the head being burnt through, I did then erect the shaft against that mighty Love; then they glowed and flamed right gleefully together; even unto this hour.

June 29. = die Jovis. — 6 a.m.

At 5 I work and have now broken my fast, etc. The great copulation is still glowing red, the Phallus almost eaten through below the glans, yet still erect and joyous.

Colour-visions few, vague, and not very brilliant; but I had a wonderful dream. I was married to a most seductive girl, but I had come to her with my hands wet with murder. I still see the first, a Siamese boy whom I disembowelled. The whole night was full of the most Sadic adventures. There was also somewhere — I can’t hitch it on right — a skeleton with nasty buttocks which he kissed with; by the laws of the dream one could not avoid him.

July 3. = Finished “De Thaumaturgia”.^[30]

This 9°=2□ initiation is sui generis — utterly unlike all others. For one thing, it takes up one’s whole life.

One is puzzled; because Chokmah is Masloth, right away from planets.

July 4. = Chokmah being 73, one day of this initiation is 73 days.

Thus; leaving England to meeting of Cat and Snake Officers,^[31] i.e., the preliminary silence and solitude was 73 x 3 days approx. I was with the Cat-Officer 3 x 73 days; alone again 73 x 1 day; with the Monkey-Officer 73 x 1 day; 8 Chokmah-days in all so far.

During this night I had a dream, part of some orgie with a marvellous black woman of some tribe I do not know, part of a future wife — medium brown hair, rather small, compact, very soft, sweet, and absolutely radiating devotion and domesticity. In her arms was a baby; the Lord of the Dream (which was an invoked Dream) told me that this was to come. I should recognize the woman by her modesty, and the simplicity of her love. She is to have money of her own. Well, we’ll see.

July 8. = Tarot for this period following Monkey-Officer 2W between 9W and 7P.

Geomancy. Shall I get ample funds for publishing, etc., including living as I like; if so, when? (I did this div. very seriously, giving my reasons for making it.)

G.M. Conjunctio. Total 124.

1. Puella. 2. Carcer. 3. Puer. 4 Laetitia. 5. F. Minor. 6. Caput. 7. Acquis. 8. Puer. 9. Trist. 10. Via. 11. Cauda. 12. Rubeus. T.S. Conj. J. Via. T.D. Carcer.

Fig. exc. for 4th; bad for 2nd. Time: A solar and four lunar figs. Ans. Yes; before end of 1917.

It came to me some days back — I wickedly did not record it — that a Magus must burn up the whole of his karma. As a M.T. he is all-Receptiveness; as a Magus all-Activity. True, he pours out Himself in a certain mould or form^[32] according to His Original Nature. But this Nature has been masked by karma. This is symbolized in Liber 418 by the burning of the Book T. to ashes.^[33]

The Qabalah of primes is all utterly unwritten. May the Holy One grant it unto me. TO QRHION.

TO MEGA QRHION = 666 = my full name.

Note Star (formed by this name) includes Sephiroth 1–9. The Name has 8 letters between TO and ON.

TO ON = Existence = tat sat. It is a Temurah of MEIQRA GH .^[34]

July 11. = Heard fro S.H. Frater Nemo, 8°=3□, of His attainment of That Grade.^[35] This removes a bar to my full grade of 9°=2□.

(I had heard before, by wire, on descending from the train at Bristol; but I had a blind fit on.)^[36]

July 12. = 5:00 p.m. A storm struck the lake; I went out to put my canoe in safety. Returning, I found a father, mother, and child who had taken refuge under my roof. I was wet through, and went into the Middle Chamber of the cottage to change my clothes. I had just got the clean shirt on, and was stooping for the trousers, when a globe of fire burst a few inches from my right foot. A spark sprang to the middle joint of the middle finger of my left hand.

From this I conclude:

1. The Masters still need me; the Initiation is real. Cf. the fall with my horse on the Burma-China frontier in 1905.

2. I have repeatedly thought that death must be the issue of this initiation. This is then wrong.

It seems to me as if this Initiation were taking place “elsewhere,” i.e., not in my consciousness at all. It is obviously too big for my human consciousness; yet its results must work down through that.

I will write down my woe, that maybe it be thereby alleviated.

… There is nothing in me that corresponds at all to the grade. There is utter impotence on all planes. This has persisted through the whole period, save for short spells, when I have been more or less normal. But always I slip back into the state for which I find idiocy an adequate and even euphemistic term. I do not in the least fail to understand the grade; I am simply unable to act. It is no good making up my mind to do anything material; for I have no means. But this would vanish if I could make up my mind. I am as it were inhibited from everything. I am tempted for example to crucify a toad, or copulate with a duck, sheep, or goat, or set a house on fire or murder someone with the idea — a perfectly good magical idea, of course — that some supreme violation of all the laws of my being would break my karma, or dissolve the spell that seems to bind me. And I cannot do it, because (chiefly) I have no faith that it would actually do so. T.

Note dream of Feb. 15, 1915, as to “killing the Lion very dead indeed.”^[37]

Perhaps I worry too much about “When shall I be free?” Perhaps after having preached to others so much of serpents and humming-birds, I myself may be a castaway! At all events, every species of divination on this matter gives negative results.

July 13. = 12:15 a.m. I omitted a rather important corollary of my Message of yesterday afternoon. It was this: that I ought not to degrade myself by working at anything whatever ut the one thing: to preach my Law, either directly or by Art. In short, no more Vanity Fair, no more Stuart X., no more Miss Adams.^[38] As Dante said to me at the National Arts Club: “Canst not thou go into the street, and starve?”

July 15. = “I waited patiently upon ihvh; and he inclined unto me, and heafd my cry”; ergo, I prayed while I waited. “He brought me up also out of the horrible pit, and out of the miry clay (America?) and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings.” Thus both rest and motion are assured. “And hath put a new song in my mouth, even prasie unto our God.” Then I hope I’ll write one.

These versicles came to me while I lit my bonfire — which despite much recent rain went splendidly of itself from the start.

July 16. = Wrote “Good Hunting.”^[39] (Very vivid dream at night of Fra. F.P., who could speak and hear perfectly.)^[40]

July 17. = Performed the ceremony of the assumption of the curse of the Grade of Mage. ÇT. B.^[41] Record attached.^[42]

0. The Mystery of Conception — about 2 a.m.
I. The Mystery of Birth — about 6 a.m.
II. The Mystery of Baptism — about noon.
III. The Mystery of Worship — all day.
IV. The Mystery of Trial — 9:00 p.m.
V. The Mystery of Crucifixion — 9:30 p.m.
VI. The Mystery of Resurrection and Ascension — 9:45 p.m.

July 18. = Many strange dreams; but in particular: — I with some friends was visiting a strange Black King who was with a wife and either a child or a second wife, I was on his right hand. Many curious dishes were brought in and eaten, and at last a man baked in a special casserole cut to human shape. He carved me a slice of the hand, which kept the shape of the profile as it lay on the plate. I ate it. It was delicious, simple as mutton, yet as rich as foie gras. I was wondering how I could get a second helping when I woke up.

— 9:15 p.m. It has just struck me to set up a figure of the Heavens for the hour when I accepted this grade of 9°=2□.

[...]^[43]

This is very like the other figures (see Equinox I(10)) with Herschel replacing Neptune.

7

[corrupted Greek] = 666. Cf. Jones’ motto.

July 19 and 20. = Reading and revising IX° books of O.T.O.; also “The Paris Working”.^[44]

July 20. = 11 p.m. die Jovis. Op. XXXVIII. See “Rex de Arte Regia,” vol. III.^[45]

July 22. = In Boston, Mass., U.S.A. Mercury on the spot; I had $30 stolen.

July 23. = Op. XXXIX. Following this, a solar dhyāna began, but was transient, and praṇava^[46] failed to hold it. I was very tired.

July 24. = Returned to Adams Cottage.

July 25. = Very tired swimming, etc. At night tried 4 Myriam Deroxe^[47] pills (1 c.g. Morphia; 1 c.g. Opium; 1 c.g. Sparteine.) Nothing!

July 26. = Worked nearly all day on “Adams Cryptogram.” Later carved in wood with scanty instruments, but with much labour and joy, a Phallic fetish, capable of serving as a dildo, and that either single or double. Now 10:40 p.m. I am about to write a Thelema tract.

— P.S. Did so; “The Law of Liberty”.^[48]

July 28. = The planet Mercury is the moon, or feminine image, of the Sun. — 5:50 p.m. Took 400 drops Anh. Lew. Chocolate base.

— 6:15 p.m. Eyes dilated; rather dazed and excited. Also yawning.

— 7:35 p.m. Have been writing letters, etc. Effects apparently all passed off.

— 7:45 p.m. Find myself highly amused, but complaining that A.L. is a fraud. Dear old symptom!

— 7:55 p.m. (Entry with regard to VII° O.T.O., censored.)

— 8:15 p.m. There is some slight mental disturbance of the “analytical” sort; one “reasons out loud” over trivial things.

— 8:25 p.m. It takes pleasure in every trifle; and, asked to think of those things which usually distress it, dismisses them, like Jesus, with a jest.

— 8:55 p.m. Distinct tendency to excitement of ahaṃkāra — silly personal pride in one’s knowledge of Greek, one’s height, etc. — all exaggerated very much indeed. E.g., I wished I had my Hebrew and Greek Bible, so as to write my article against Shaw,^[49] and at once painted a fancy picture of myself as the ripe scholar and theologian, half partriarch, half don!!!

— 11:50 p.m. Quite normal. Re A∴A∴ (for one who was not of us), what a plot for Balzac — the rising from grade to grade amid fearful dangers, etc., and winning out — becoming equal to Buddha and Jesus and the rest — and that being the horror of Great Falsehood!

July 29. = 1:07 a.m. I perceive the use of the knife — not to divide, but to fashion things into beauty from shapelessness. Cut not to destroy, but to create. This is of the most supreme importance; see my notes to the Third Æthyr.^[50]

(This is another attempt to fix the Name “foursquare, mystic, wonderful”. Ed.)^[51]

— 9:30 a.m. Work at 8 after probably 5 1/2 hours sleep. Long dreams of war and adventure, very vivid.

Dose evidently inadequate to my exalted Grade!

My eyes are tired — but then I’ve been cooking over a wood fire in the open; I worke exceptionally active and energetic.

— […] p.m. Quite normal all day. Heard that the Monkey-Officer had miscarried (on July 12). Asked Tarot if I should go on with the affair; got 5W. with 2W. and Taurus next it, and Scorpio and Libra afar.

July 30. = Wrote “Filo de Se”,^[52] and went on carving and painting fetishes. Aug. 1 Wrote pamphlet on material advantages of O.T.O.^[53]

Aug. 2. = Wrote long letter to S.H. Fra. O.I.V.V.I.O., mostly on sex.

Aug. 3. = Quiller editing Golden Rose.^[54] Op. XL.

Aug. 4. = Canoeing and swimming all day. Wrote “Black and Silver.” A thrush came into the cottage.

Aug. 5. = I caught the thrush, but it escaped later, though I tried to tame it. Later still, I found a snake in the woods, but filaed to kill it. Writing all day “An Epistle to Parzival, etc., instructions for extending the Law.”^[55]

Aug. 6. = 12:55 a.m. Woke after dreaming twice that M.O.H.^[56] was dead. A close horrible night; lightning and low booming thunder. M.O.H. is the only thing I have of value; I am not happy. She hasn’t written all the week; and I know she hasn’t been well. I suppose it’s only a mixture of the thunder, the extreme mental fatigue and eyestrain, and possibly my new Corned Beef Croquettes. I cannot have been asleep long; and hour at most; though it had been all night; could hardly believe combined evidence of clocks and murk.

— 6:45 p.m. All day editing Golden Rose. Took 400 drops new A.L. preparation as before, but will drink wine to aid it.

Aug. 7. = Nothing at all came of this except “bien-être”,^[57] especially this day following. All a.m. dictated Shaw article. I note 15th Æthyr gives rules for work of a Magus.^[58]

Aug. 8, 9, 10. = At Shaw article all the time.

Aug. 11. = It is rather amusing after Op. of July 17 that I have now a stenographer exactly like a frog to assist me in the ceremonial slaying of Jesus in the Shaw article.

Aug. 14. = Back from Boston, and Ops. XLI–XLIII.

There is a most mysterious emptiness in the cottage. I have pointedly done all the familiar things; but it still all in vain. Nothing is changed, yet all is changed. It is as if a great banishing had been performed, but not by me. Is this the preparation for a New Current? The Rota gives AP between Libra and KtP, distant 2W. and PsS.

Thelema books give “Thou was like a flake of snow falling in the pine-clad woods,” which refers to Virgo, as to PsS. Am I to meet The Girl?

Aug. 15. = Last night wrote the O.T.O. “Ya Sin.”^[59] Now at Shaw article again.

Aug. 16. = Made preliminary experiment with Ether.

Aug. 17. = Still at Shaw.

Aug. 19. = Getting Shaw article well started. Done some 25,000 words so far. Last night and this a.m. wrote “Epistle to Prof. L.B.K.”^[60] Tried Ether again. Opn. XLIV.

Aug. 21. = An amazing discovery. The Operations to have a child by Hilarion, July 8, 1915 on, seven in all, and one upon Helen Westley, ended Sept. 12 and Sept 16 with 3 Operations at beginning and end of catamenia. These Operations are described as particularly good. On Sept. 23, the Word of the Equinox was nebulae; i.e. the Babe of an Universe — as I now see. this Eq[uino]x the Word is sol-om-on, the child of David’s adultery. Now O.I.V.V.I.O. was born June 21, exactly nine months after the Libra Equinox.^[61] On conclusion of Equinox ceremony Hilarion had seduced me; and I had concentrated on the Word just obtained. It is really very remarkable that I did no Operation for a child after this Sept 12–16. We were at Vancouver^[62] on Oct. 19, I two or three days earlier. It is to be noted, too, that Hilarion was the perfect Scarlet Woman as described in CCXX III:44. Then O.I.V.V.I.O. may be the Child coming “from no expected house”,^[63] since I always thought of a material baby, and never tried for a spiritual son (CCXX III:47) and yet the child of my bowels,^[64] since O.I.V.V.I.O. has Sagittary on the Ascendant, and Sagittary is on the cusp of my 6th House (Virgo, the bowels) and also because I did the IX° Operations for him, upon the body of Hilarion. He may be “mightier than all the kings of the Earth”^[65] because cast out into Malkuth.^[66] I woke up with these ideas in my head about 3:40 this a.m. Note, too, the dreams of Sept. 20–21, Hilarion as a Titan woman on whom I performed IX° fully. In this dream I was more than half awake. Note, too, the triple dream of three consecutive sleeps in two days immediately following that Equinox Ceremony; these were all of royalty.

The Nativity of O.I.V.V.I.O.

Vancouver B.C. June 21, ’16 e.v. 10 p.m.

All day writing and thinking out the chronology of the Initiation to Magus. The crises at the dawn of a Chokmah-day are amazing.

Aug. 22. = 8:05 p.m. Tarot; what shall I do tonight? Pisces with AC and 10W; distant PW and Jupiter. Nothing came of it; I merely revised Syllabus of Sacred Books.^[67]

Aug. 23. = Note that this long solitude has developed my physical clairvoyance to its old pitch; I can tell the suit of a card, and usually whether it is high or low; right nearly every time.

I want, too, to place on record my certainty that all my failures came from abandoning my magick formula — of the moment — as I do now and again in deference to “rational” considerations.  

— 7:35 p.m. I have been sucking up to the vapour of Ether for a few moments, and all common things are touched with beauty. So, too, with opium and cocaine, calm, peace, happiness, without special object, result from a few minutes of those drugs. What clearer proof that all depends on state of mind, that it is foolish to alter externals. A million spent on objets d’art would not have made this room as beautiful as it is just now — and there is not one beautiful thing in it, except myself. Man is only a little lower than the angels; one step, and all glory is ours!  

— 8:02 p.m. More Ether: a delightful case of the “a” state caught for once. I started to think I would write an article urging men to Yoga by above arguments. Next, I would write a beautiful article. Next: the tragedy of it is that I shall merely have written one more beautiful thing! I then cried “O God!”, recognizing the state of “deep calling unto deep!” There were some physical futilities — tapping — starting to play Patience — then Science won, and I jumpted up to write this down. The “a” state is very active; e.g., the antithesis in the above sentence between “up” and “down” excites all sorts of ideas.  

— 9:05 p.m. And more. There is a state of (visualized) mind which I’ve been calling the Ultimate samādhi — in this state!

nothingness with twinkles.^[68]

It appears that will and memory are exceptionally good under Ether; but I am taking the drug in an unusual way, the active nostril to the can, and it may be the usual business of stimulation and exhaustion and that I experience my present advantages owing to my being new to Ether. Or of course it may be specially suited to me physiologically — though I remember this hypothesis when I began most other drugs!  

— 9:43 p.m. Soon I got “Nothingness with twinkles — but what twinkles!” and now I find all that merely physical. It’s the old resolution of splendour into Bliss.^[69] Ether-states are, as science says, ephemeral; so are all drugstates; it’s an instability. Time flies fast, though. I note that toleration of the sharpness of the smell of the ether is acquired gradually. Hence one should allow 3 hours or so to get honestly drunk, taking an easy curve.

Aug. 24. = At Shaw again. Read The Way of All Flesh.^[70]

Aug. 25. = 5:12 p.m. More Ether. I come to the solution of an old problem through mathematics. I begin by trying to help the whores off Broadway.

“You’ll be able to get ether quite easily, and it’s just as good as cocaine, only it takes a few minutes longer to work — and what’s a few minutes in a matter like that?” Now I got the idea of the interrelation of small cycles and the apparent independence of large ones. Thus you spend your life like Darwin or like Gilles de Rais — a mere fraction of a revolution of Neptune includes it. Then I saw that all things in time are interdependent, and that what is always is, because 1 and 1022 are after all relatives.

— 6 p.m. Op. XLV.

— 9:20 p.m. If I am ever caught in an error, I shall excuse myself by saying that I did not mean what I said, but that “I have often thought that there is not enough talking done in the world, and I wished to make discussion.” The above appears to me one of the funniest things ever said.

Aug. 27. = More Shaw yesterday; fagged by week’s work. Read Frazer’s Dying God,^[71] and worked on Shaw. 4 M.D. pills at night — nothing much but considerations for “Liber LXX”.^[72]

Aug. 30. = Have done a lot more Shaw, and started a series of short stories based on folklore.^[73] Wrote “The Priest of Nemi” all today, 4400 words.

Aug. 31. = All day at Shaw and “Mass of St. Secaire.”

Sept. 1. = Finished “St. Secaire” and St. Bernard Shaw too, thank Hermes!

Sept. 2. = Wrote “The Burning of Melcarth.”

Sept. 3. = At the “Corycian Cave” yarn.

— 10:30 p.m. Op. XLVI.

Sept. 4. = Finished “Corycian Cave.”

Sept. 6. = Beginning “The Priestess of Cybele.”

In these months of loneliness those women only attract whom I have half-finished: Anny Ringler, Myriam Deroxe, Doris Gomez. To keep a woman forever, get thoroughly excited, then quit.

— 11:30. An experiment with ether has been in progress. I have just seen (!!!!!!!!) the difference between the Holy Guardian Angel of Abramelin and such “material” visions, and all interior illumination whatever. The former gives proof to the man as man of a celestial hierarchy; it relieves him of his main fear — materialism itself. Hence mysticism is no good to convince people — in comparison with magick, You must argue with the man you arguing with; mysticism is like making him drunk.

— 11:50. I now see why the Buddha said: “Don’t fight error; preach the Good Law!” Too much error to fight! Dissipating energies! Even Christianity is hardly worth fighting; so many atheists are shocked if one does! Therefore:

Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.

and nothing else.

— 5:00. I find ether has a curious effect apparently on the solar plexus; hard to describe. It seems almost as if it were a nervous spasm of sorts, in a very mild way.

Sept. 7. = Finished “The Stone of Cybele.” Letter from Myriam in N.Y. She wrote about Aug. 27. Op. XLVII.

Sept. 8. = Diarrhoea and headache. Half asleep nearly all day. p.m. began “The God of Ibreez.”

Sept. 9. = Finished “The God of Ibreez.” And very nearly finished Aleister Crowley!

Sept. 10–11. = Wrote “The Old Man of the Peepul-tree.”

Sept. 12. = Woke after the hideous nightmare that I call the “Mislaid MSS.” It may have been too much Chianti, or too many Page and Shaw candies; I have applied the old-fashioned but well-tried and never-failing method — cold pork chops and hot chocolate. There were stories and plays — more wonderful than anything ever — and the MSS. were I didn’t know quite where, and I couldn’t quite remember the names and contents of the MSS. But they had that rich flavour that MSS. only have in dream.

— 8:30. Slept again several times. The same dream went on, this time with printed Thelema books, and then another small book of about that size, but full of dozens of weird novelettes and essays and dialogues.

Sept. 13. = Writing “The Hearth.”

Note on pratyāhāra. What people miss is the a yogin can get as much fun out of swinging his leg as a Western millionaire out of his first season in New York. This ought to be worked up for propaganda purposes. (Need I say above means ether?)

— 8:35. Op. XLVIII.

Sept. 14. = I continue “The Hearth.”

Why I really envy God. He knows all the follies of humanity; so he must laugh a million times as much as I, who only contemplate my visit to a town where I cannot get a glass of beer, and where the chemist hesitates before adding a teaspoonful of alcohol to a tooth-wash, but sells me a pound can of ether without a wink.

— 9:30. Finished “The Hearth.”

Sept. 15. = Professor L. M. Keasbey, of the University of Texas, here on a visit to me.

At night I was being nightmared, a railway line with vast trains running over me in all directions, lots of narrow escapes. Woke with a burst in the brain, very loud. this might make a new story for Golden Twigs, “The Iron Age,” which should connect the oppression of humanity with the use of coal and iron.

Sept. 16, 17, 18. = Talking to Keasbey. It appears as if this were the Word awaited. I am to go to Texas on Nov. 4, and start there O.T.O. there.^[74]

Sept. 19. = Merely reading Frazer’s Taboo, etc.^[75]

Sept. 20. = Ether. It is impossible to make a tragedy of a man’s leaving his wife; because woman don’t count. They only exist insofar as they seduce or otherwise destroy men. A deserted woman may be comic or pathetic; never tragic.^[76]

(And then I went to sleep. I’m in deep reaction after the heavy work of the last six weeks.)

Sept. 22. = 9:15 p.m. The ceremony of the Equinox has been performed, the Word “sagittae ” coming (by my clock) at 9:05. It may be a litle fast or slow. However, call it 9:23:00, Gemini rising. Op. XLIX.

I perceive that the Word lies latent in the s...n of a Magus, and being placed in the mouth of the Victim, becomes a Word. Hence ritual rubric. The Operation was extremely good in the magical sense. I trust Sagittae refers to “The Paris Working” — arrows shot in the war against the Slave-gods. The Thelema divination is “O thou delicious God, smile sinister!”,^[77] a Phallic reference.

A geomantic divination gave Amissio for G.M. 100 for total. 1. F. Minor. 2. Acq. 3. Cauda. 4. albus. 5. Amissio. 6. Populus. 7. F. Minor. 8. Pop. 9. Amiss. 10. Alb. 11. Acq. 12. Cauda.

Sept. 23. = I find MITOS to be the Orphic word for S.... Hence Baphomet means evidently the Baptism of the Holy Ghost.

Phanes = the Shining One, Augoeides, in Orphic; he is the bisexual Phallic god.

Revised The Gospel according to Saint Bernard Shaw.

Have been continuing Frazer, and started Jung’s Psychology of the Unconscious.

Sept. 24. = Last night, wakefulness, followed by disturbed dreams. Jung had stimulated me. I remembered my three dream-places; I have not thought of them for years.

1. The town rather like Cambridge, but with some continental touches. There is a street like the way down Garret Hostel Lane, but with old wooden hosues, in one of which lives a sluttish but very fascinating servant-girl. In this town is also a hill covered with cottages, full of slaveys and low whores, who all accept me in a luscious vicious way.

2. the Hacienda, a few miles beyond a Mexican town, where I have sex-adventuers with the “owneress.”

3. The caverns in Cairo. A secret door leads to an underground bazaar, full of devotees of every fiendish vice.

I was also sexually excited by a wire to say that Gerda was coming.)^[78]

I think I can see a way to get samādhi easily by certain applications of Jung’s theories.

Sept. 25. = 10:30 p.m. Op. L.

Sept. 27. = 12:30 a.m. Op. LI. This during mild ether experiment.

I note that intellect is a detached phenomenon, a mere excrescence in the soul. It is the personality, and the tendencies, which are made manifest by drugs.

Sept. 29. = 1:20 a.m. Op. LII.

— 8:25 p.m. Op. LIII.

Sept. 30. = As often remarked previously, one cannot work at all with women in the house. In future I will never have anything but a bedder aspectu horribilis.^[79] So help me God.

— 11:45 p.m. Op. LIV.

Oct. 3. = 12:35 a.m. Op. LV.

I note the period March 29 to Aug. 22 as that in Egyptian rituals where one has a lot of small gods in the pylons. So here I had officers monkey, rat, owl, frog, and ram. These will presumably dovetail to prepare the next period.

Oct. 4. = 4:35 p.m. Op. LVI.

Oct. 6. = Devised constitutional government for O.T.O.^[80]

Oct. 7.= 12:45 a.m. Op. LVIII.

Oct. 9. = 12:30 a.m. Op. LIX. A restless night full of ideas, especially “The Dwarf,” a story or play of Rabelais type on Jung’s theories. ……

About a week ago Gerda took Elixir, and had a non-elixir vision. Monks in brown robes and hoods go up a green hill, with misty top, in an endless line. They wear rings with a red cross within a gold triangle. This was on Thursday. On Friday I went myself to see the top of the hill. There was a great cross with three rings, and an open sarcophagus in front. Saturday, Gerda succeeded in reaching the top, and saw, without having been told of my vision, a cross with a sun on it and a heap of stones in front. Sunday, she went again, and found the cross black and mouldering; in front, a bowl in the earth with fire in it, burning the stones to ashes. The monks have throughout had their faces covered with their hands.

The symbols are remarkable as being formulæ of Adept Minor, Magister Templi and Magus.

On Monday she started to pull my poor leg by copying Hebrew from Equinox, and offering it as evidential. My attitude seems to have discouraged her in this career of infamy.

I note that a fortnight has elapsed since the girls came; seems like three days. Who lives alone lives long.

Lodges, profess-houses, etc., should always be oriented to Boleskine. Made notes about government of O.T.O.

Oct. 12. = 7:45 a.m. Op. LX. Holiness to the lord.

Oct. 14. = 1:20 a.m. Op. LXI.

Oct. 15. = Sudden fever yesterday. Better today.

Oct. 16. = To Potter’s Place, through getting in wrong train.

Oct. 17. = To New York.

Nov. 1 to Dec. 9. = In N.Y.; a.m. of Dec. 9. arr. New Orleans for a G.M.R.

Dec. 10. = Op. LXXXI, dedicating myself anew to Thoth.

Dec. 11. = Op. LXXXII.

Dec. 13. = Op. LXXXIII.

Dec. 15. = Twice recently the Lord has showed me signal favour, by sending a sufficient sum of money when I was within a dollar or so of actual starvation. It is really very kind of Him, and I am aware that this is the usual practice in such cases, but I have had about ten years of it, and “I’m through.” I don’t care what the practice is; my faith is in perfect working order; I enjoy the Beatific Vision practically without cessation; I’m not complaining. I’m merely going on strike. For my power to work is being hampered exceedingly by the constant worries about things like stenographers and printers. The Book of the Law is quite clear; we are to have a good time in the ordinary sense of the word. And if the Book is wrong, then the whole question lapses. Georgie, the negro maid, came in this morning; I said I was annoyed because I had to go out to get a registered letter. She said that she didn’t have to go out if she didn’t want to; the madam could go out herself. Am I to be taught the simplest elements by Georgie? Yea, verily, and Amen!

I therefore down tools until I have (1) a competent stenographer (2) money enough in hand to see me comfortably through until the Equinox of Spring, this to include payment of all American liabilities and clothes (3) a guarantee — by some signal sign or in some more practical manner — that all will be well in future. I intend to interpret this in the most liberal way; and shall add to it this fourth demand (4) means of publishing immediately all MSS. except those destined for Equinox III.

This strike is to include all work for O.T.O. as well as A∴A∴. I shall not inform the Brethren of my decision; if the Gods can keep silence, so can I. If I can’t, I’ll learn how.

Dec. 16. = I voice this complaint under Ether, taken with purely vicious purpose. Yet thoughts turn to old ways malgre moi, and I get “There is the swordsman waiting to spring into the saddle.”^[81]

Dec. 20. = There is a peculiar attitude of mind which perceives all things, irrespective of their nature, to be beautiful. E.g., how glorious to have a really free nostril!!!!

Now this idea is of a quite distinct order of idea from the ........? Who classes ideas?^[82]

Dec. 22. = Monkey-Officer wires passionate appeal to me to come to New York for Christmas.

Dec. 23. = Ether. The bride had picked up a book at random from the shelves of the Hotel. “Two parts of Hydrogen combine with one of Oxygen,” she read, “to form water.” “The acceleration due to gravitation is 32 feet per second.” “The beast!” she cried; “he does not understand Love!” The above is a parable for 9°=2□s, in staircases. But — which side are you on; and why?

Dec. 23–24 = ; midnight. I rise to record that for two days past I have had the premonition of great things impending.

Dec. 26. = Long curious dream last night. I was a priest of the Jesuit type in a profess-house or college of some kind. Edward VII came into the dream and figured prominently for some time, a long time. His first appearance was jumping from a balcony 5 ft. 6 in. high; I went to help him up.

— 9:54 p.m. Ether. “Here is a Magus assuming that the whole fabric of the universe ought to coincide with his psychology. Which is absurd.” The perception that it is absurd is a perception belonging to a low and limited order of brain.

Note. Under Ether I always get this question of strata of thought. I do hope something will come of it — creative work.

To explain above I must say that I was arguing with the other Masters about finance, expecting them to foresee all and provide. I saw the rationalist objection, and the answer to it. We do assume a great mind capable of attending to everything at once, and dovetailing it. A rationalist could never conceive of a man playing chess, whose moves are certainly ordered by intelligence, however much that intelligence may be conditioned by prior circumstances.

Therefore, I believe nothing. But I know this; that I have been dealing with intelligences as far superior to my own as mine is to Hereward Carrington’s — I say an extreme thing! — and I shall continue to strike with confidence that I am not fighting the air, but pitting myself against Those whose only folly seems to be that They called me Wise. This is the Eleventh day of the Strike.^[83]

— 10:25. What is man? A soap-bubble blown by a spermatozoon.

— 10:35. Yet every act we do, however foolish or futile, goes branching on for eternity — an infinite heritage.

(The 10:25 remark was not purely sarcastic; it meant that man with all his diseases, etc., was implicit in the spermatozoon.)

— 10:52. Have just passed through an Ordeal. Can’t explain — take years. General idea — “Damn it — what’s anything worth without money?” Cry of Magus “I refuse.” Keen sense of ridicule of the priggishness of it all, then and now. But a real sense of the choice between superficial and true things.

I’m inclined to think that the back of the Strike is broken.

The shame is on Them if I starve.

However, bother details. The point in above record is that the “I refuse” rang out clear and true above all the jarring sounds (Tennyson). It really was a test, and therion won.

Dec. 27. = Another long dream of being entertained at some American club. The Kaiser came into it, but very vaguely.

I am now going to start Work again, with absolutely no resources. I have not even proper paper or money to buy it. Total cash in hand 70 cents.

Dec. 28. = Last night yet a third dream involving royalty, I forget how.

Dec. 29. = Another dream; this time I was a boy, and present at the death of Queen Victoria.

Jan. 13 [1917 e.v. ]. = A letter from Dr. A.K. Coomaraswamy^[84] (the Worm) in re The Path. Replied to it.^[85]

I note, with all stimulant drugs, that if one is with others, the force is entirely dissipated, usually on the sex-plane. If one is alone, one becomes creative at once. This is important, as establishing the kuṇdalini doctrine, with its upper and lower exits. It does not bear, however, on the doctrine of abstinence from sex; for in normal excitement the sex seems to stimulate the other creative power.

Jan. 14. = 1:30 a.m. Just finished writing lecture^[86] for II° on government of O.T.O.^[87]

Jan. 15. = Began Simon Iff novel.^[88]

Note that we naturally and inevitably divide women into chaste and unchaste; thereby subconsciously affirming that C. is the only important thing about them.

Jan. 19. = I have been getting the Tao more and more every day for a week; and I have a completely original idea for a game of cards ……

Jan. 31. = Op. LXXXIV.

Feb. 1. = I’ve been thinking that I should have paid more attention to climate. Damp but soft airs always breed the Taoist passive-love type of mysticism. I must arrange to include this in my curriculum; it should help folk.^[89]

Mem[orandum]. I note Taoists also insist a good deal on respiration- work, not quite ordinary prāṇāyāma. I think I will find out the best drugs to reduce the rate of breathing, and get hold of that end of the stick, as Fra. I.A.^[90] used to say, once more.

Feb. 2. = My 21/4 years’ work crowned with success; U.S.A. breaks off relations with Germany.^[91]

Feb. 9. = Arrived at Titusville, Florida.

March 5. = Op. LXXXVI.

March 6. = Threatened severe frost. I averted same, to repay my cousin^[92] for his hospitality. The Op. was very remarkable. I went out at noon, in bitter cold and high wind; and I willed. I then slept very deeply for three hours, and woke in still, warm weather, with the sun shining. The forecasts had given several days of cold; and forecasts in America are very different to those in England; they rarely go wrong.

 

Part IV ^[93]

An. xiii Sol in Aries. [March 21, 1917 e.v. ]

The last few days of the last Equinox have been devoted to the conclusion of various affairs, the revision and edition of ecclesiæ gnosticæ catholicæ canon missæ,^[94] and so on, with the resumption of my Simon Iff novel.^[95] There were several serious obstacles to the due performance of the Ceremony of the Equinox; but I overcame them, and at about 10 p.m. on this day of Jupiter obtained the Word for the next six months.

ynda

The Message in Thelema is this LXV V:24. “Also thou art beyond the stabilities of Being and of Consciousness and of Bliss; for I am thou, and the Pillar is ’stablished in the void.” The Tarot gives as a symbol PsS between 6W and 7C (♃ in ♌ and ♀ in ♏, Victory and Illusionary Success) distrust the Emperor, to whom she looks, and PC looking away from her. This girl also suggest the “Brown Girl” in the dream of last summer; but also all promises well for my affairs.

March 23, 1917 e.v. = I wonder if it be true, as often asserted, that Genius is the final flower of a graft. If so the S[eme]n of a genius is really worthless; and he is therefore justified in throwing it about as he does. “The Master of the House is one who does not care to hear disputes.” It is absolutely impossible to convey the profundity of this thought. It began thus. “Instead of having the (exciting) time I am now having, I might have been asleep, if it had not occurred to me to etc.” This was answered by a deterministic fellow; he by a freewill fiend; and so on. Then I came and said “Damn it all, what’s this noise in my house?” It’s the same as the “beyond the Abyss” doctrine; but in terms of psychological experience.

March 29. = die ♃. I have been finishing my long novel, rounding up things generally. A new and powerful impulse arrived last night, a letter from Fiat Pax.^[96] The Stupids have misunderstood my whole attitude, and raised trouble. Now I go direct to Washington to straighten this out; if I fail this time to get them to listen to sense, at least I can go to Canada and force them to arrest me. My hand is therefore at last upon the lever. Left Titusville 8:03 a.m. this morning.

April 21. = I seem to have nothing to record but dreams. Magical work is utterly impossible in N.Y. City. But this dream is quite unique in my life. I went to Egypt, to some excavations. In a chamber of a ruined temple sat a man named R.C.D. Balfour-Campbell (!) who knew Battiscombe Gunn.^[97] Then suddenly I had some power given me by a god named Tef-Gu, or some similar name; I’m sure of the Tef and that it was not Tef-nut. We were moved on in some procession by another god, and Campbell preceded me in a space between wall and table. I felt myself “lost” if I went on; my only chance was to protest instantly; I exerted my whole will and retraced my step, to the utter amazement of the shepherding god, who said “But you can’t” as who should say “2 plus 2 must make 4.” The reset I forget. But two days later I am still wondering about this dream, almost all the time. The dream was on the night of dies Juppiter 19 April.

April 22. = The body is cautious — fire, etc. — because its heredity has so taught it. (Possibly man the animal becomes more cowardly every generation. Think of the primitive man hunting the aurochs — and the modern American!) But soul has no fear, nor can have. Therefore a man’s courage depends on the quantity of soul available. So the most spiritual men are the most courageous. (Language confirms: “spirited.”)

— 12:45. I have been doubting of late. Events have been terrible — hopeless. Now I came in meditation to a thought concerning Mercury as an healer — and I laughed, crying “But I am Mercury! Mercurius sum!” With this came a flash that something more was meant. The ecstasy gave place to a rapid calculation; and lo! JErmh" eijmi = 418.

— 1:05. It was an error to proceed. I wanted the Highest — the Knowledge and Conversation of my Holy Guardian Angel — I said “Let me not etc. let from the illusions.” Then said mine Holy Guardian Angel unto me: “You’ve had the Vision of the Universal Beauty — and what good has it done you?” I am still frustrated by this supreme skepticism from that Supreme Quarter. I must simply go on — down the Precipice!

— 1:10. I have an idea for a story of an old English lady who notices eyeholes in a skull as offering no resistance to a narrow sharp instrument, and then kills a Prussian with her crochet-hook in the same way.

— 1:22. The answer to the 1:05 question is that I am the Universal Beauty — and I know it. Alas, I am this, that — everything. The “I am I” formula is not merely “wicked,” it’s the Restriction of the Predicate that makes it so idiotic. The Word of Sin is Restriction. ^[98] Any time you think you are not any thing, that’s restriction. This is the same as the “duality” argument, put another way. O how clear is my mind. Aum tat sva ha.^[99]

May 6. = Had news of my mother’s death. Two nights before news had dream that she was dead, with a feeling of extreme distress. The same happened two nights before I had news of my father’s death. I had often dreamed that my mother had died, but never with that helpless lonely feeling.

May 27. = My health has been constantly bad — a mixture of swamp fever and rheumatism, fugitive neuralgic symptoms, etc. — at least I most sincerely hope so, i.e. from A.C.’s point of view.

But I myself (sawya) have been considering all the time how to act as to Crowley’s body and mind. Can I use it any more? Wouldn’t my ideas get ahead much faster if he were dead? Shouldn’t I be wise to manifest in another, or in a multitude?

This practice has been nightly for some few days — I dare say ten. It has helped greatly my poor client Crowley, who now sees the point of the Buddhist corpse-meditations and their congeners. (Written after doing Op. 3, An. xiii .)

May 31. = I have completed Opus 4, 5, 6 with the Object of the Promulgation of the Law. It appears that I should concentrate wholly on this, leaving it to Those invoked forces to arrange the details. I know the other way, the way of doing one petty operation after another is more interesting and more spectacular; but I think the only valid reason for using it is that one can follow one’s work better, and the point of this is strongest when one does not know much about the Method. In other words, the real Adept should go straight to the point. However, am I such an adedt — so far? I still do operations now and then which produce the exact contrary of the desired result. But in doing an operation which is in actual hermony with one’s whole karma-Will, such accidents should be impossible.

June 14. = I note after Butler that tanha is a longing for continued separation, and so a form of hate. So desire for fame is desire for a fixity in separation; yet all fixity is death. So “personal life” is hate, and perfection, which is “death,” is hate too. Another proof of the duality of all intellectual concepts. Forgetting is death, but so is remembering; for the one implies the other. So with all opposites; but beyond the opposites is not, as we hastily syllogize, a “transcendant unity” but a Something quite beyond definition or conception. The Universe is an organic whole; to be conscious of every detail of it, any more than a cat is conscious of every hair on her body. The realization must be “impressionistic”; and the mental image of it intensely biased. Therefore we must enlarge the mind as well as quell it.

I am getting quite to the point of habitual recognition of myself as sawya and it does much good. But I have seen lately the danger of having a mental machine which functions so independently of the Self, and even of the human will. E.g., all my sympathies are most profoundly with the Allies; but my brain refuses to think as sympathizers seem to do; so in argument I often seem “pro-German.” Similarly, I have a Socialistic or Anarchistic brain, but an Aristocrat’s heart; hence constant muddle not in myself, but in others who observe me.

The Illusion is always attacking Conscious Crowley in curious subconscious ways. One catches oneself assuming that C.C. has some importance to something, that this bundle of sticks is worth keeping tied, for example. It is hard to express how deep and subtle this has become; as a matter of fact, my brain constantly baulks at the analysis. “Change” is the special subject of a Magus; and all terms seem to have become entirely fluid.

I must confess to moral paralysis, by the way; hope has been practically extinguished, and I now realize how hard it is to work without that insidious drug. One doesn’t want to take a chance any more; the thought of wasting energy has become insuperable; I can only do a thing when I am sure of the result, or very nearly so. My life-work seems to have gone to utter smash at the exact moment when it was to have flowered. And this also pertaineth unto the Grade of a Magus, and I give Salutation to the Prophet of Allah, for like unto his case is mine also.

Aug. 28. = The symptom which has obsessed me since April, five months now, is as I thought, and think, a sarcoma of the tibia. But I have reconquered general good health and high spirits — ten very vigorous IX° and XI° operations in 12 days! — I have overcome the financial trouble to some purpose; and this without destroying the conviction of my approaching change. My diagnosis may be be wrong; in any case I have had the ordeal. Yet I am quite cheerfully making plans for the “future” which will probably never arrive.

By the way, the “Brown Girl” has materialized exactly as seen in my vision of last year,^[100] and the Tarot card of this Equinox. Anna Catherine Miller is her name and we are living together in a room on Central Park West, where we can see nothing but trees! Glory to the Otz Chiim,^[101] in whose boughs the Wonder Bird, the Swan Paramahansa, makes his nest.^[102]

Sept. 3. = Last night (C2H5)2O.

Prāṇā. Ether makes all body glow; but after [ART] the glow stops above mūlādhāra. This glow is spherical or auric, not branching as it would be if nervous in origin. This is an argument for auras. It is love that opens the gates of the heavens, will that shuts those of the hells. I got this as a flash of cosmic memory. As a rational corollary, I got: Love is the power to say “yes”; will the power to say “no.” Cheap epigram leading to heresy; beware!

My 9°=2□ consciousness is now quite fixed in the depths.

There is a point in evolution where all the different lines of argument run together with a rush I was identifying the eye of a potato with the Eye of Horus, when all the other eyes joined in the dance! This always happens as the consciousness expands, becomes erectile or enthusiastic, in the course of any general resolution of propositions.

Asked by Anubis, my dog-headed concubine,^[103] to say something else beautiful about love, I replied: “Ill-temper is a disagreeable quality, but it never gave anybody the clap.”

Kipling is a Puritan. “The sins ye do two by two” etc.^[104] Qelhma must be the touch-stone of the true artist. “A sarcoma is fed in thesame way as the body; so it ought to share in the general glee of ether.” It does so; consciousness feels glad of this. This seems a good joke, with a Christmassy flavour, so I laugh. Then I think of those who don’t see the joke, like the poor little boys who have no turkey, so I get a maudlin sadness. this is all one idea and might be called the Pickwick-complex!

“One stops taking ether not from fear, but because one reaches one’s limit. This is distressing, but should not be. One has done one’s own Great work; it is for one’s Holy Guardian Angel to do His. Yet I can slip into ivadar ana any moment. — What are moments?

Sept. 4. = I have had 3 “royal” dreams again in these two nights past. 1. Roosevelt wanted me to go campaigning with him. 2. Rockefeller, who was a man with Juppiter rising in Sagittarius — gave me dinner, which I did not eat, by the way — and got very interested in my astrology, etc. 3. A long romantic dream of Charles II, an elopement, a burning mansion, etc., etc. I don’t remember quite how any king came in; it was quite typically a royal dream.

Sept. 23. = 10:30 p.m. An. xiii . Sol in Libra.

A very elaborate operation in which as the result of a most profound psychology I obtained the Word “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.” Objections that it is not a single word, etc., are quite nugatory. I object to recasting it as Qelhma, for instance. I cannot possibly explain the series of exclusions which I have devised for obtaining the supreme Consciousness and Will; but it doth suffice.

The Qelhma divination^[105] is “VII” VI:14: “There are deep secrets in these songs. to enjoy song he must be the bird.”

Sept. 27. = I’ve been ill — liver chill and cold, etc. Every phenomenon is a Change; all Change is interesting as such; therefore the Universe is Joy. But the Idealist, with his Fixed God, is always disappointed. The Masters of Truth are the only happy men, though they constantly observe what men stupidly call Sorrow.

Jan. 7, 1918 e.v. = I observe that a period has come in my life when Attainment for its own sake is no longer wanted. “Who go into samādhi?” This is I think a proof of the perfect destruction of “Sorrow.” The practical point is that I now do all those things which voluptuaries do, with equal or greater enthusiasm and power; but always for an Ulterior End. In this manner I am reproached by that whore of niggers and dogs, Mrs. Zainn^[106] with whom I am now living in much worse than adultery; for she exhorts me to the Way of the Tao. But is not this for me perhaps That Way, that I should always follow Art and the Salvation of the World? Am I not Saint Edward, the Warden, and Alexander, Helper of Men? I seem also to remember that in my Chinese name Kwaw is a fortress. However ……^[107]

Jan. 31 [1918 e.v. ] = Since last entry there has been the initiation of a new and very strong magical current. Eve^[108] has been getting visions and messages, evidently authentic, since her informant solved the problem of the spelling of Baphomet, and other things which had baffled me for a long time.^[109]

An. xiv. Sol in Aries. (March 21, 1918.) The Word of the Equinox, obtained through V.H.V.I.V.I. Soror Achitha,^[110] is “Akamrach”; the meaning to be obtained later. It refers to a great stream of clear water, Chesed.

July 19. = Began Great Magical Retirement in canoe on Hudson. (See Liber XCVII.)^[111]

 

Footnotes

[1] [This description is by Crowley, from “The Official Instructions of A∴A∴”, Book 4, Parts I–IV, rev. ed., Appendix I, §4, p. 467.]

[2][CITE.]

[3][Adapted from Crowley’s Confessions, abridged ed., pp. 795–797.]

[4] Cf. Rabelais: the final secret is in the bottle inscribed trinc.

[5] [The chronology of the Chokmah-days is roughly as follows; italicized dates are confirmed in Crowley’s writings:
I. Nov. 3, 1914–Jan. 14, 1915. Confessions, p. 826. In “Liber 73” (July 4, 1916) Crowley notes he was alone.
II. Jan. 15–March 28, 1915. Ditto.
III. March 29–June 9, 1915. Ditto. Crowley refers back to “three Chokmah days” ending on June 9 in Confessions, p. 798.
IV. June 10–Aug. 21, 1915. In “Liber 73” (July 4, 1916) Crowley notes he was with the Cat.
V. Aug. 22–Nov. 2, 1915. Ditto.
VI. Nov. 3, 1915–Jan. 14, 1916. Ditto. See Confessions, p. 805, where Crowley relates that he broke up with the Cat.
VII. Jan. 15–March 27, 1916. In “Liber 73” (July 4, 1916) Crowley notes that he was alone, but see Confessions, p. 805.
VIII. March 28–June 8, 1916. In “Liber 73” (July 4, 1916) Crowley notes he was with the Monkey-Officer.
IX. June 9–Aug. 20, 1916. See Confessions, p. 806. In “Liber 73” he calculates, on July 4, 1916, that he has had 8 days so far.
X. Aug. 21–Nov. 1, 1916.
XI. Nov. 2, 1916–Jan. 13, 1917.
XII. Jan. 14–March 27, 1917.
XIII. March 28–June 9, 1917. See Confessions, p. 826.
XIV. June 9–Aug. 21, 1917. The Dog. See Confessions, p. 826.
XV. Aug. 22–Nov. 2, 1917.
XVI. Nov. 3, 1917–Jan. 14, 1918. The Camel.
XVII. Jan. 15-March 28, 1918.
XVIII. March 29–June 9, 1918. Olun in here somewhere.
XIX. June 10–Aug. 21, 1918.
XX. Aug. 22, 1918–Nov. 2, 1918.
XXI. Nov. 3, 1918–Jan. 14, 1919. Meets the Ape of Thoth in early January. See Confessions, p. 848, where he states that with her appearance his “journey through the Desert had reached its last stage.”

[6] [These “Officers” (portraits of many of whom appear as Figs. XXX–XXX, facing p. XREF) were given theriomorphic names as follows.
Crowley notes that their function changed with Chokmah-day XIV, June 9, 1917 (Confessions, abridged ed., p. 826) when “the function of the officers was no longer to administer ordeals (I had passed the tests); they were sent as guides to lead me on a journey through the Desert to the appointed ‘House of the Juggler’ in which a Magus symbolically lives.” In approximate order of appearance:
The Cat. Jeanne Robert Foster, née Ollivier. The Scarlet Woman Hilarion. See Confessions, abridged ed., pp. LOOK UP, 805.
The Snake.
The Monkey. Ratan Devi (Alice Ethel Coomaraswamy, née Richardson, the wife of Ananda K. Coomaraswamy. See Confessions, abridged ed., pp. 773–6, 805–6).
The Owl. Confessions, abridged ed., pp. 805–6.
The Dog. Anna Catherine Miller. Appeared Chokmah-day XIV. See Confessions, p. 826. [SEE ALSO 781.]
The Camel. Roddie Minor, or Mrs. Zain [CHECK]. The Scarlet Woman Achitha. See Confessions, pp. 832 ff.
Olun.
The Ape. Lea Hirsig. The Scarlet Woman Alostrael. See Confessions, p. 841, where Crowley describes her as “the last of the officers in my initiation.”]

[7] [Part numbers and stars are used by the present editor to demarcate the different portions of the diary, which covers (with some gaps) the period from late 1914 – early 1918 e.v. ]

[8] This titles is given on a loose MS. title page to the first diary included in “Liber 73.” This also gave “Section F, Nov. 4, 1914–March 10, 1915 e.v., Chokmah-day VII.” It appears that Section C in this series was “Liber 415”. Sections D–E are apparently not extant. The date range corresponds roughly with Part I of “Liber 73” as published here. The reference to as the Chokmah-day series itself began on Nov. 3, 1914, unless another series is intended which would have begun around Aug. 17, 1913.

[9] About the title and date ["The colloquy of V.V.V.V.V. (that is to be a Magus 9°=2" A:.A:.) with ☿"]: — [V.V.V.V.V. = Vi Veri Vniversum Vivus Vici = "By the force of truth, I, while living, have conquered the universe" : Crowley's motto as a Master of the Temple, 8°= 3" A.·. A.·.] — [9°=2" : A few months later Crowley decided that he had been accepted by the Secret Chiefs as a Magus and he accordingly underwent the ordeals.] — [☿ is Toth / Hermes] — [ΘΩΘ {Greek} = Thoth.] — [Anno X of the Aeon of Horus, initiated by Crowley in 1904, hence A.D. 1914.]

[10] "Rex de arte Regia" (The Magical Diary of Baphomet). — Between 1914 and 1918 Crowley's own diary Rex de Arte Regia, records a long series of 309 acts of sexual magic for a variety of purposes. These included both spiritual aims, such as offering praise to Pan or attaining supernatural powers, and more material aims, such as fascinating mistresses or enhancing his youth and sexual attraction. Of these, the largest number (48) were employed to for the purpose of generating money. Increasingly worried about his own finances, Crowley developed a sexo-economic technique of imagining a shower of gold coins raining down at the moment of climax. At least in his opinion, this worked, since he claimed to receive several unexpected checks and offers showing up out of the blue. (...) [quote from "Magia Sexualis: Sex, Magic, and Liberation in Modern Western Esotericism" by Hugh B. Urban] — [This diary was kept in parallel with the present diary; indications of “Op.,” “Opus” or “Operation” followed by a number are usually crossreferences to Crowley’s O.T.O. diary. (Op. refer to 'operations' from the "Rex de arte Regia".)]

[11] [A ritual by Allan Bennett, adapted by Crowley as “Liber Israfel sub figura LXIV”; see Works Cited. His use of this invocation is noted in the diary as “Inv. ☿.”]

[12] [“Liber VII” V:1.]

[13] [CITE Bornless.]

[14] [“Liber 860”, Crowley’s 1908 e.v. diary. See Works Cited.]

[15] [Apparently Crowley’s phone number (e.g., Columbia 4572), and the address of his New York apartment.]

[16] [Enochian, TRANS. and ID.]

[17] [A variant of the first hymn (to Juppiter) from the “Holy Hymns to the Great Gods of Heaven”; see p. 291 infra. “And just as when the priest purifies the boy / With foaming seed, while the other rejoicing accepts the waters, / Sprinkle, I pray, Jupiter, king of gods and men, all powerful, / Golden gifts upon thy servant.” NEED TRANSLATION FOR THIS VERSION.]

[18] [Morphine.]

[19] [Lat., “my mistake, my greatest mistake.”]

[20] [ID this mistress from Rex de arte Regia or Confessions if possible. Is she the streetwalker with the heart of gold?]

[21] [Crowley’s diary for mid-March 1915 through mid-June 1916 is lost, if written. Symonds & Grant say Rex de arte Regia has a gap for June 1915–Feb. 1916. This entry survives as quotations in Crowley’s Confessions, abridged ed., p. 800, and in his commentary to Liber 418. CHECK REX DE ARTE REGIA MSS HERE, THIS LOOKS LIKE IT’S FROM THERE.]

[22] [TRANS.]

[23] I say “a cube”; yet its most salient property was that it was without boundaries. Experience of similar trances is necessary for the understanding of this statement, which is a perfectly proper expression of a perfectly observed fact, despite its intellectual self-contradiction.

[24] [Crowley’s diary for mid-March 1915 through mid-June 1916 is lost, if written. [Symonds & Grant say Rex de arte Regia has a gap for June 1915–Feb. 1916. This single entry survives in a holograph notebook at HRHRC, the same notebook that contains the MS of “Holy Hymns.]

[25] [Jeanne Robert Foster, the Cat.]

[26] [Probably Doris Gomez.] N SC B

[27] [GIVE PROVENANCE.]

[28] P.S. March 12, ’17. One cannot act freely as a Magus must if one has this inhibition.

[29] [Anhalonium lewinii, WRITE UP. ANNOTATED ELSEWHERE.]

[30] [“Liber 633, Concerning the Working of Wonders”; see Works Cited.]

[31] [IDENTIFY. CITE CONFESSIONS ACCOUNT.]

[32] See “Liber I” v. 14.

[33] [XREF.]

[34] [TRANS. GK. AND SKT.]

[35] [Crowley refers to Charles Stansfeld Jones (DATES), a Zelator 2°=9· of A∴A∴ to took the Oath of the Abyss on the Summer Solstice.]

[36] [Crowley was notified by telegram on DATE, but apparently failed to understand Jones’ somewhat cryptic message.]

[37] [See p. 23.]

[38] [After arriving in the United States, Crowley wrote for Vanity Fair, contributed an introduction to a privately-produced work on geopolitics by a Washington, D.C. writer who used the pseudonym Stuart X. (CITE), and collaborated the the astrologer Evangeline Adams (DATES) on astrological books. Adams owned the cottage Crowley was staying in during this period.]

[39] [CITE.]

[40] [ID COWIE.]

[41] [This refers to “Liber 70”, given in full on page 71.]

[42] [The record is the summary and schedule of his performance of the ritual as given here.]

[43] [The astrological chart does not appear in the typescript, and it is uncertain exactly when he means.]

[44] [XREF.]

[45] [CITE MRB666.]

[46] praṇava means "Cosmic Sound" - The syllable OM is referred to as praṇava

[47] [ID Myriam Deroxe.]

[48] [CITE.]

[49] [Liber 888 - Jesus: The Gospel According to Bernard Shaw. See The Equinox III(2); see Works Cited.]

[50] [XREF.]

[51] [CITE. “Ed.” is Crowley acting as his own editor.]

[52] [CITE.]

[53] [CITE.]

[54] [CITE. Quiller was one of Crowley’s many literary pseudonymns.]

[55] [CITE Liber 300.]

[56] [Mother of Heaven, i.e. Leila Waddell. ID WADDELL.]

[57] [TRANS.]

[58] [XREF.]

[59] Letter to Anna Wright and her Companions. [“Liber 106, On Death”. WHAT ON EARTH IS YA SIN, HEBREW FOR LAST RITES?]

[60] [ID Prof. Keasbey, CITE.]

[61] [That is, born as a Babe of the Abyss.]

[62] [Where Fra. O.I.V.V.I.O. lived.]

[63] [CITE.]

[64] [CITE.]

[65] [CITE.]

[66] See his record. [See CITE; also CITE PART TWO, EQ. III(2).]

[67] [CITE EQ. III(1) VERSION.]

[68] [This passage describes what Crowley would later term “The Star-Sponge Vision”; it is cited frequently in his commentaries to Liber AL and elsewhere.]

[69] [A fragment among Crowley’s papers (Warburg Institute) entitled “Platitudes” relates to “The Star-Sponge Vision” (and, most likely, ether):

“(Star-Sponge, — where it is recognized as being the nervous system.)

“Start with anything. Begin to make magical discoveries about it. Go through a whole series of experiences each of which is an explosively joyous samādhi. You soar from height to height until you come out at the final disclosure, which you hasten to put into words. Having done so, you ercognize that these words are a platitude. At first you have the horrible sensation of being completely fooled, but by concentrating on this idea you perceive with great joy the true nature of the platitude, which is the sum of human wisdom on that particular subject. And what you have done in the course of the whole series of meditations which have ended in this way, is to have retraced the whole superb course of human thought on this line.”]

[70] [A novel by the younger Samuel Butler (DATES); see Works Cited.]

[71] [CITE, IF IT EXISTS AS THIS TITLE; PROB. GB CHAPTER.]

[72] [XREF. WHAT COULD HE MEAN, HE ALREADY DID IT.]

[73] [These became Golden Twigs, some of which were published in The International in DATE. The collected stories were published posthumously; see Works Cited. Except for St. Bernard Shaw, the titles written from Aug. 30–Sept. 14 are in this series.]

[74] P.S. Events were too strong for Keasbey, who got obsessed. [Soon after visiting Crowley, Keasbey was dismissed from the institutional history chair at the University of Texas at Austin. A few years later he converted to Roman Catholicism, and died soon thereafter.]

[75] [CITE.]

[76] P.S. Note how hard Balzac tried to make the Baronne Hulot d’Ervy tragic; at the last he had to give it up, and put the cap on with the georgeously comic episode of finding her husband, over 80, in bed with an ugly and stupid servant-girl, whom he marries after the shock has killed the wife.

[77] VII III:47.

[78] 78 [ID Gerda von Kothek.]

[79] [TRANS.]

[80] [NOT 194. NOT NECESARILY A PAPER, CHECK OUTTAKES.]

[81] P.S. This journey to New Orleans was a desperate magical effort. I started with only $40 besides my fare. I did this because all sorts of obstacles seemed to be barring my journey to Texas, and, though I could hardly go to Texas without due invitation, I tought I would get near enough to defy Fate, as it were. I did this quite against my obvious interests of the material order. T. 14/3/17.

[82] P.S. I wish the A∴A∴ would grant the Workman’s demands.

[83] P.S. 14/3/17. Without animism, one might argue that as some things are causally connected directly, [all] things are so ultimately, and that therefore it is not irrational to expect that the condition of a mind should coincide with the whole structure of the Universe.

[84] [BIO.]

[85] P.S. This correspondence ended in the discovery of the Worm as a Black Brother; it has been very useful to have the type to study.

[86] [CITE 194.]

[87] P.S. 14/3/17. Note that during this period 6 Simon Iff stories, nearly 50,000 words, 3 other short stories, an essay, and several minor things had been written. This enabled the other masters to have a good laugh at Therion for saying that his work was being hampered.

[88] [Moonchild (Liber 81). See Works Cited.]

[89] P.S. Taoism sprang in the Yangtze delta, did it not? Buddhism certainly in the Ganges valley; Christianity was invented mostly at Alexandria; that is, the languid mystic bits were surely added in the Nile Delta; Sufism comes from the valleys of the Euphrates and Tigris; Mormonism was invented in the Mississippi valley. The Law was given at Cairo, in the Nile Delta. This ought to be worked up, with a great deal of pains, comparing the differences with those religions which have sprung up on heights, and in plains.

[90] 90 [Allan Bennett, IDENTIFY.]

[91] [Crowley is referring to his work for the pro-German publication The Fatherland, which he always said was a disinformation campaign, while his critics called him a traitor to England. This diary entry confirms Crowley’s position.]

[92] [Lawrence Bishop.]

[93] [From the holograph manuscript notebook, Warburg Institute.]

[94] [CITE.]

[95] [CITE Moonchild.]

[96] [ID COWIE.]

[97] [ID Gunn.]

[98] [CITE.]

[99] [CHECK USUAL FORM.]

[100] [XREF.]

[101] [Hebrew, “Tree of Life.”]

[102] I am aware that terrestrial swans don’t nest in trees.

[103] [Anna Catherine Miller, whom Crowley called the Dog.]

[104] [CITE QUOTE.]

[105] [Bibliomancy using The Holy Books of Thelema.]

[106] [Or Zaiim; the typist was unsure. This was Roddie Minor, whom Crowley called the Camel. She became the Scarlet Woman, Soror Achitha (Ahita, or Achita), and was also called Eve.]

[107] [The typescript notes “The Magical diary since Sept. 27 is in the O.T.O. Record. See “Rex de arte Regia,” CITE.]

[108] [Roddie Minor.]

[109] [CITE LIBER 729.]

[110] [The address “Very Holy, Very Illuminated, Very Illustrious” is a variant of the O.T.O. custom for addressing a member of the IX°.]

[111] [This paper, “Soror Achitha’s Vision”, was believed lost. See however the surviving fragment of “The Hermit of Æsopus Island, p. XREF.]