The Unprinted Literature of Ceremonial Magic

For the purposes of the present, inquiry it will be convenient to consider the Rituals under the three heads of Transcendental, Composite and Black, subject, as regards the first, to some specific qualifications which will appear in the second chapter, and subject, in respect of all, to the perfect understanding that these three are one. So far as may be possible, the antiquity of individual Rituals will be determined in the course of their examination, but as this inquiry is based, with a single exception of undeniable importance, upon the printed literature, because it is that only which has exercised a real influence, it may be well, as a conclusion to this introductory part, to give some information regarding magical processes which have remained in manuscript, and are to be found only, or can at least be consulted only, in the public libraries of Europe. Almost without exception, the source of their inspiration is the work mentioned in the preface, namely, The Key of Solomon, and they are consequently of later date. The Library of the Arsénal at Paris has a reputation for being especially rich in Magical MSS., but there is also a large collection in the British Museum which may be regarded as typical. There is nothing of earlier date or more importance among the French treasures, and, to determine the question of antiquity in a few words, there is nothing among our own that is much anterior to the beginning of the fourteenth century.

The numerical strength of the treatises, late and early combined, is in itself considerable, but, setting aside the codices made use of by the English editor of The Key of Solomon, the interest of which was exhausted long since by the appearance of that work, there are only three small classes or cycles to which an especial appeal attaches in connection with the present inquiry. The first may be termed the group of Honorius, comprising three MSS.; the second is that of the Sepher Raziel, of which there are two forms; the third includes the English codices of the Lemegeton. The chief MS. of the first group is also one of the most ancient treatises dealing with Magic in the library. This is Sloane 313, a Latin MS. on vellum, in a bad state of preservation. The close writing and abbreviations make it somewhat difficult to read. It is interesting, however, because it connects with the Grimoire of Honorius, one of the most historical and notable Rituals of Black Magic, being the work of some person bearing that name. It belongs to the fourteenth century and has no title or other determinate name, but it appears from the text that it was understood to be the Sworn Book of Honorius. The introduction or prologue to the work is obscurely worded in the initial pages, but it seems to account for the condemnation of magic by the prelates of the Church on the ground that they have been deceived by demons. The result is the convocation of all the "masters of Magic," to the number of 811, all of whom seem to have come out of Naples, Athens and a place. entitled Tholetus. Among these a species of spokesman was chosen, whose name was Honorius, the son of Euclidus, Master of the Thebans. He was deputed to work for the rest, and he entered into counsel with an angel called Hochmel or Hocroel, (? Hochmaël), and thereafter wrote seven volumes of Magical Art, "giving the kernel to us and the shells to others." From these books he seems afterwards to have extracted ninety-three chapters, containing a summary of the whole subject, and made them into a volume which "we term the sacred or sworn book." In the meantime, the princes and prelates, having burned "certain fables or trifles," concluded that they had completely destroyed the art, and were therefore pacified. The magicians, however, took an oath among themselves to preserve the masterpiece of Honorius in the most secret and careful manner, making three copies at the most, the possessor of any example being bound over to bury it before his decease, or otherwise insure its interment in his own grave, unless there were some trusty and worthy person to whom it could be transmitted. It is interesting to note that this is the Law of Transmission in respect of Alchemy. The important point about the MS. itself is that it fixes the source of the mendacious tradition which ascribes a Grimoire of Black Magic to a Pope of the name of Honorius, as will be seen at length later on. The Sworn Book is not, of course, the Grimoire, but the existence and reputed authorship of the one will enable us to understand the attribution of the other. Honorius the sorcerer was identified with Honorius the Pope, firstly by the confused mind of magical legend, and secondly by conscious imposture, much after the same manner that Raymond Lully, the "illuminated doctor" of Majorca, was identified with Lully the alchemist, by tradition at the inception, and not long afterwards by the help of forged treatises. The Sworn Book is in other respects remarkable, and has been unaccountably overlooked by writers on Ceremonial Magic; it may be taken to indicate that an association of magicians was most probably in corporate existence during or before the fourteenth century. While it is clearly of Christian origin, it derives from the supposed works of Solomon, and would appear to indicate that the Solomonic cycle was at that time only in course of formation, as also that the earliest elements approximate not to the Grand Clavicle, but to the Little Key, otherwise, the Lemegeton. As to the operations contained in the Sworn Book, they are those of White and Black Magic, undiscriminated, without, however, any trace of the conventional "dealing with the devil." The MS. under notice need not, of course, be regarded as the original; as to this there is no means of knowing. The British Museum possesses also a later transcript, belonging to the sixteenth century, and a most valuable English translation, written on vellum in beautiful Gothic characters. It is referred to the fifteenth century.

The second group comprises two MSS., both in the Sloane collection, and both containing, among other treatises, the important and curious work attributed to Solomon under the title of Sepher Raziel. That numbered 3826 belongs to the sixteenth century. It is an English translation of a Latin original which in this form is unknown to myself; the first line of the original is usually given at the beginning of each section. It is divided into seven books, and purports to have been sent to Solomon by a prince of Babylon who was greater and more worshipful than all men of his time, his name being Sameton, while the two wise men who brought it were called Kamazan and Zazant. The Latin title of the treatise is said to be Angelus Magnus Secreti Creatoris; it was the first book after Adam, was written in the language of Chaldea and afterwards was translated into Hebrew. It is a noticeable fact that in this work the first section is entitled Clavis, and if we may regard the Sepher Raziel as antedating theClaviculæ, it explains why a Key was attributed to Solomon. The Clavis in question is, however, concerned with the magical influences of the stars, "without which we can effect nothing." The second book is called Ala; it treats of the virtues of stones, herbs and beasts. The third is Tractatus Thymiamalum, the use of which term connects it with the Sworn Book of Honorius; it treats of suffumigations. The fourth sets out the times of the year, day and night which are disposed to operation; the fifth embodies the laws regarding lustrations and abstinence; while the sixth, calledSamaim, expounds the nature of the heavens, of the angels and of the operations of each. The seventh and last book is concerned with the virtues of names. A Latin version of the Sepher Raziel occurs in Sloane MS. 3853, ascribed to the same period. It differs from the former in several considerable respects, being also much shorter and full of rare magical symbols.

The MSS. of the third group are all in English, and all of late date.

Sloane 2731 is a very neat MS., begun on January 10, 1676, and containing the entire Lemegeton, or Lesser Key of Solomon, in English. Some account of this celebrated work, which has so unaccountably escaped publication, will be found in the third chapter of this part. Sloane 3648 is another manuscript of the Lemegeton, also in English, together with the Ars Notoria, a book of invocations and prayers attributed to Solomon, of which there are many examples extant in England and on the Continent. 1 It is a work which connects with Magic without being itself Magical, and, in fact, stands in much the same relation to the Key or Clavicle as the Enchiridion of Pope Leo to the Isagoge of the Arbatel. Lastly, the same MS. contains the Magical Archidoxies of Paracelsus, but the version seems to be quite distinct from the treatise so entitled in the Geneva folio, containing the collected writings of the German adept. 1 In either case, it is not a work of Ceremonial Magic, its title notwithstanding. Sloane 3805 is a quarto MS., chiefly alchemical and medical, comprising a translation of the forged epistles of Sendivogius, and towards the end the Lemegeton, started by the writer apparently with the intention of transcribing all the works attributed to Solomon under the heading of this angelic name. It breaks off, however, at the end of the offices of the thirteenth spirit belonging to the Infernal Hierarchy.

It should be added that the three groups contain materials which are common to all. The independent treatises which follow the Sepher Raziel in Sloane 3826 extract matter from the Sworn Book, while that entitled Liber Lunæ, concerning the intelligences of the mansions of the moon, the squares of the planets, their seals, rings and so forth--which, by the way, seems in this form unknown to modern critics--has given material to other and later collections.

The unprinted literature of Ceremonial Magic offers a considerable field to research, though even in the historical or bibliographical interest it is questionable whether it would repay the pains, unless research of all kinds whatsoever is to be regarded as its own reward. Among the miscellaneous MSS. in the British Museum, it is here only necessary to notice two, as they contain materials connected with the present design. Sloane 3884 includes a process in Necromancy--how to call the ghost of a dead body--the invocation of spirits into a crystal--the form for summoning spirits within the circle--and a method of exorcism in the Tuscan language,--all impudently attributed to the author of the Nullity of Magic--that is to say, Roger Bacon. In the second part of my present work a special chapter is devoted to Infernal Necromancy, and the MS. here mentioned will be useful for purposes of reference. Sloane 3850 is a MS. of the seventeenth century, which contains transcripts from the fourth book of Cornelius Agrippa and from the Heptameron of Peter de Abano in Latin. There is also a Good and Proved Experiment for evocation, which uses the Pater, Ave, Credo and Litany of the Saints as magical formulae. Finally, there are processes, mostly in Latin, but some in English, for the discovery of things lost, the recovery of things stolen, for the spirits of the dead who cannot rest in their graves, and for persons possessed by evil spirits. The treatise De Novem Candariis Salomonis, containing curious figures and sigils, deserves particular mention, as this again seems unknown to students. Its attribution notwithstanding, it is the work of a Catholic writer.

The Distinction between White and Black Magic

Having considered the possible standpoints from which the Rituals may be regarded, we come now to the distinctions that are made between them, and, first and foremost, to that which has been already mentioned and is artificially instituted between White and Black Magic. The history of this distinction is exceedingly obscure, but there can be no question that in its main aspect it is modern--that is to say, in so far as it depends upon a sharp contrast between Good and Evil Spirits. In Egypt, in India and in Greece, there was no dealing with devils in the Christian sense of the expression; Typhon, Juggernaut and Hecate were not less divine than the gods of the over-world, and the offices of Canidia were probably in their way as sacred as the peaceful mysteries of Ceres.

Each of the occult sciences was, however, liable to that species of abuse which is technically but fantastically known as Black Magic. Astrology, or the appreciation of the celestial influences in their operation upon the nature and life of man, could be perverted in the composition of malefic talismans by means of those influences. Esoteric Medicine, which consisted in the application of occult forces to the healing of disease in man, and included a traditional knowledge of the medicinal properties resident in some substances disregarded by ordinary pharmacy, 1 produced in its malpractice the secret science of poisoning and the destruction of health, reason or life by unseen forces. The transmutation of metals by Alchemy resulted in their sophistication. In like manner, Divination, or the processes by which lucidity was supposed to be induced, became debased into various forms of witchcraft and Ceremonial Magic into dealing with devils. White Ceremonial Magic is, by the terms of its definition, an attempt to communicate with Good Spirits for a good, or at least an innocent, purpose. Black Magic is the attempt to communicate with Evil Spirits for an evil, or for any, purpose.

The contrasts here established seem on the surface perfectly clear. When we come, however, to compare the ceremonial literature of the two classes, we shall find that the distinction is by no means so sharp as might be inferred from the definitions. In the first place, so-called Theurgic Ceremonial, under the pretence of White Magic, usually includes the Rites for the invocation of Evil Spirits. Supposing that they are so invoked for the enforced performance of works contrary to their nature, the issue becomes complicated at once, and White Magic must then be defined as the attempt to communicate with Good or Evil Spirits for a good, or at least for an innocent, purpose. This, of course, still leaves a tolerably clear distinction, though not one that I should admit, if I admitted the practical side of the entire subject to anything but unconditional condemnation. Yet the alternative between a good and an innocent object contains all the material for a further confusion. It will be made clear as I proceed that the purposes and ambitions of Magic are commonly very childish, so that we must distinguish really between Black and White Magic, not as between the essentially good and evil, but as between that which is certainly evil and that which may only be foolish. Nor does this exhaust the difficulty. As will also be made evident in proceeding, White Ceremonial Magic seems to admit of a number of intentions which are objectionable, as well as many that are frivolous. Hence it must be inferred that there is no very sharp distinction between the two branches of the Art. It cannot be said, even, that Black Magic is invariably and White Magic occasionally evil. What is called Black Magic is by no means diabolical invariably; it is almost as much concerned with preposterous and stupid processes as the White variety with those of an accursed kind. Thus, the most which can be stated is that the literature falls chiefly into two classes, one of which usually terms itself Black, but that they overlap one another.

In what perhaps it may be permissible to call the mind of Magic, as distinct from the effects which are proposed by the Rituals, there has been always a tolerable contrast between the two branches corresponding to Magus and Sorcerer, and the fact that the ceremonial literature tends to the confusion of the distinction may perhaps only stamp it as garbled. But this is not to say that it has been tampered with in the sense of having been perverted by editors. White Magic has not usually been written down into Black; Goëtic Rituals have not been written up in pseudo-celestial terms. They are, for the most part, naturally composite, and it would be impossible to separate their elements without modifying their structure.

Modern occultism has taken up the clear distinction and developed it Appealing to the secret traditional knowledge behind the written word of Magic--to that unmanifested science which it believes to exist behind all science--and to the religion behind all religion, as if the two were related or identical, it affirms that the advanced occult life has been entered by two classes of adepts, who have been sometimes fantastically distinguished as the Brothers of the Right and the Brothers of the Left, transcendental good and transcendental evil being specified as their respective ends, and in each case they are something altogether different from what is understood conventionally by either White or Black Magic. As might be expected, the literature of the subject does not bear out this development, but, by the terms of the proposition, this is scarcely to be regarded as an objection. For the rest, if many rumours and a few questionable revelations must lead us to concede, within certain limits, that there may have been some recrudescence of diabolism in more than one country of Europe, some attempt at the present day to communicate formally with the Powers of Darkness, it must be said that this attempt returns in its old likeness and not invested with the sublimities and terrors of the modern view. Parisian Diabolism, for example, in so far as it may be admitted to exist, is the Black Magic of the Grimoire and not the sovereign horror of the Brothers of the Left Hand Path, wearing their iniquity like an aureole, and deathless in spiritual evil. These enigmatical personages are, however, the creation of romance, as are also their exalted, or at least purified, confrères. Between Rosicrucian initiates of astral processes and the amatores diaboli there is indubitably the bond of union which arises from one fact: il n'y a pas des gens plus embêtants que ces gens-là.

The Importance of Ceremonial Magic

THE ordinary fields of psychological inquiry, largely in possession of the pathologist, are fringed by a borderland of occult and dubious experiment into which pathologists may occasionally venture, but it is left for the most part to unchartered explorers. Beyond these fields and this borderland there lies the legendary wonder-world of Theurgy, so called, of Magic and Sorcery, a world of fascination or terror, as the mind which regards it is tempered, but in either case the antithesis of admitted possibility. There all paradoxes seem to obtain actually, contradictions coexist logically, the effect is greater than the cause and the shadow more than the substance. Therein the visible melts into the unseen, the invisible is manifested openly, motion from place to place is accomplished without traversing the intervening distance, matter passes through matter. There two straight lines may enclose a space; space has a fourth dimension, and untrodden fields beyond it; without metaphor and without evasion, the circle is mathematically squared. There life is prolonged, youth renewed, physical immortality secured. There earth becomes gold, and gold earth. There words and wishes possess creative power, thoughts are things, desire realises its object. There, also, the dead live and the hierarchies of extra-mundane intelligence are within easy communication, and become ministers or tormentors, guides or destroyers, of man. There the Law of Continuity is suspended by the interference of the higher Law of Fantasia.

But, unhappily, this domain of enchantment is in all respects comparable to the gold of Faerie, which is presumably its medium of exchange. It cannot withstand daylight, the test of the human eye, or the scale of reason. When these are applied, its paradox becomes an anticlimax, its antithesis ludicrous; its contradictions are without genius; its mathematical marvels end in a verbal quibble; its elixirs fail even as purges; its transmutations do not need exposure at the assayer's hands; its marvel-working words prove barbarous mutilations of dead languages, and are impotent from the moment that they are understood; departed friends, and even planetary intelligences, must not be seized by the skirts, for they are apt to desert their draperies, and these are not like the mantle of Elijah.

The little contrast here instituted will serve to exhibit that there are at least two points of view regarding Magic and its mysteries--the simple and homogeneous view, prevailing within a charmed circle among the few survivals whom reason has not hindered from entering, and that of the world without, which is more complex, more composite, but sometimes more reasonable only by imputation. There is also a third view, in which legend is checked by legend and wonder substituted for wonder. Here it is not the Law of Continuity persisting in its formulae despite the Law of Fantasia; it is Croquemetaine explained by Diabolus, the runes of Elf-land read with the interpretation of Infernus; it is the Law of Bell and Candle, the Law of Exorcism, and its final expression is in the terms of the auto-da-fé. For this view the wonder-world exists without any question, except that of the Holy Tribunal; it is not what it seems, but is adjustable to the eye of faith in the light from the Lamp of the Sanctuaries; in a word, its angels are demons, its Melusines stryges, its phantoms vampires, its spells and mysteries the Black Science. Here Magic itself rises up and responds that there is a Black and a White Art, an Art of Hermes and an Art of Canidia, a Science of the Height and a Science of the Abyss, of Metatron and Belial. In this manner a fourth point of view emerges; they are all, however, illusive; there is the positive illusion of the legend, affirmed by the remaining adherents of its literal sense, and the negative illusion which denies the legend crassly without considering that there is a possibility behind it; there is the illusion which accounts for the legend by an opposite hypothesis, and the illusion of the legend which reaffirms itself with a distinction. When these have been disposed of, there remain two really important questions--the question of the Mystics and the question of history and literature. To a very large extent the first is closed to discussion, because the considerations which it involves cannot be presented with profit on either side in the public assemblies of the reading world. So far as may be held possible, it has been dealt with already. As regards the second, it is the large concern and purpose of this inquiry, and the limits of its importance may therefore be stated shortly.

There can be no extensive literatures without motives proportionate to account for them. If we take the magical literature of Western Europe from the Middle Ages and onward, we shall find that it is moderately large. Now, the acting principles in the creation of that literature will prove to rule also in its history; what is obscure in the one may be understood by help of the other; each reacted upon each; as the literature grew, it helped to make the history, and the new history was so much additional material for further literature. There were, of course, many motive principles at work, for the literature and history of Magic are alike exceedingly intricate, and there are many interpretations of principles which are apt to be confused with the principles, as, for example, the influence of what is loosely called superstition upon ignorance; these and any interpretations must be ruled out of an inquiry like the present. The main principles are summed in the conception of a number of assumed mysterious forces in the universe which could be put in operation by man, or at least followed in their secret processes. In the ultimate, however, they could all be rendered secondary, if not passive, to the will of man; for even in astrology, which was the discernment of forces regarded as peculiarly fatal, there was an art of ruling, and sapiens dominabitur astris became an axiom of the science. This conception culminated or centred in the doctrine of unseen, intelligent powers, with whom it was possible for prepared persons to communicate; the methods by which this communication was attempted are the most important processes of Magic, and the books which embody these methods, called Ceremonial Magic, are the most important part of the literature. Here, that is to say, is the only branch of the subject which it is necessary to understand in order to understand the history. Had Magic been focussed in the reading of the stars, it would have possessed no history to speak of, for astrology involved intellectual equipments which, comparatively speaking, were possible only to the few. Had Magic centred in the transmutation of metals, it would never have moved multitudes, but would have remained what that still is, the quixotic hope which emerges at a far distance from the science of chemistry. We may take the remaining occult sciences collectively, but there is nothing in them of themselves which would make history. In virtue of the synthetic doctrine which has been already formulated, they were all magically possible, but they were all subsidiary to that which was head and crown of all--the art of dealing with spirits. The presumed possession of the secret of this art made Magic formidable, and made therefore its history. There was a time indeed when Ceremonial Magic threatened to absorb the whole circle of the occult sciences; it was the superior method, the royal road; it effected immediately what the others accomplished laboriously, after a long time. 1 It had, moreover, the palmary recommendation that it was a conventional art, working by definite formulæ; above all, it was a process in words.

It was the fascination of this process which brought men and women-all sorts and conditions of both--to the Black Sabbath and to the White Sabbath, 2 and blinded them to the danger of the stake. It was the full and clear acceptation of this process as effectual by Church and State which kindled the faggots for the magician in every Christian land. Astrology was scarcely discouraged, and if the alchemist were occasionally tortured, it was only to extract his secret. There was no danger in these things, and hence there was no judgment against them, except by imputation from their company; but Magic, but dealing with spirits, was that which made even the peasant tremble, and when the peasant shakes at his hearth, the king is not secure in his palace nor the Pope at St. Peter's, unless both can protect their own. Moreover, in the very claim of Ceremonial Magic there was an implied competition with the essential claim of the Church. 1

The importance of Ceremonial Magic, and of the literature which embodies it, to the history of the occult sciences being admitted, there is no need to argue that this history is a legitimate and reasonable study; in such a case, knowledge is its own end, and there can be certainly no question as to the distinguished influence which has been exercised by the belief in Magic throughout the ages. In order, however, to understand the literature of Magic, it is necessary to obtain first of all a clear principle of regarding it. It will be superfluous to say that we must surrender the legends, as such, to those who work in legends, and dispute about their essential value. We need not debate whether Magic, for example, can really square the circle, as magicians testify, or whether such an operation is impossible even to Magic, as commonly would be objected by those who deny the art. We need not seriously discuss the proposition that the devil assists the magicians to perform a mathematical impossibility, or its qualified form, that the circle can be squared indifferently by those who invoke the angel Cassiel of the hierarchy of Uriel and those who invoke Astaroth. We shall see very shortly, as already indicated in the preface, that we are dealing with a bizarre literature, which passes, by various fantastic phases, through all folly into crime. We have to account for these characteristics.

The desire to communicate with spirits is older than history; it connects with ineradicable principles in human nature, which have been discussed too often for it to be necessary to recite them here; and the attempts to satisfy that desire have usually taken a shape which does gross outrage to reason. Between the most ancient processes, such as those of Chaldean Magic, and the rites of the Middle Ages, there are marked correspondences, and there is something of common doctrine, as distinct from intention, in which identity would more or less obtain, underlying them both. The doctrine of compulsion, or the power which both forms pretended to exercise even upon superior spirits by the use of certain words, is a case in point. In approaching the Ceremonial Magic of the Middle Ages, we must therefore bear in mind that we are dealing with a literature which, though modern in its actual presentation, embodies some elements of great antiquity. 1 It is doubtful whether the presence of these elements can be accounted for on the principle that mankind in all ages works unconsciously for the accomplishment of similar intentions in an analogous way; a bizarre intention, of course, tends independently to be fulfilled in a bizarre manner, but in this case the similarity is so close that it is more easily explained by the perpetuation--sporadic and natural or concerted and artificial--of an antique tradition, for which channels could be readily assigned. There is one upon the face of the literature, and that is the vehicle of Kabalistic symbolism, though it cannot be held to cover the entire distance in time.

There have been two ways of regarding the large and imperfectly explored literature which embodies the Kabalah of the Jews, and these in turn will give two methods of accounting for the spurious and grotesque processes which enter so extensively into Ceremonial Magic. It is treated either as a barren mystification, a collection of supremely absurd treatises, in which obscure nonsense is enunciated with preternatural solemnity, or it is regarded as a body of theosophy, written chiefly in the form of symbolism. The first view is that which is formed, I suppose, almost irresistibly upon a superficial acquaintance, and there is not any need to add that it is the one which obtains generally in derived judgments, for here, as in other cases, the second-hand opinion issues from the most available source. It is just to add that it does not differ very seriously from the opinions expressed in the past by a certain section of scholarship. The alternative judgment is that which prevails among those students of the literature who have approached it with a certain preparation through acquaintance with other channels of the Secret Tradition. From the one it would follow that the Ceremonial Magic which at a long distance draws from the Kabalah, reproduces its absurdities, possibly with further exaggerations, or it is the subject-matter of the literature carried to its final results. Two erroneous views have issued from the other--an exaggerated importance attributed to the processes in question on the ground of their exalted connections, and--this, however, is rarely met with--an inclination to regard them also as symbolical writing.

There is no ground for the criticism of the first inference, which has arisen legitimately enough and is that which will be most acceptable to the majority of readers. Those who value Kabalistic literature as a storehouse of symbolism, the inner sense of which is or may be of importance, but see nothing in the processes of Ceremonial Magic to make them momentous in their literal sense or susceptible to interpretation, will be tempted to dismiss them as mediæval and later impostures, which must be carefully distinguished from the true symbolical tradition. In either case the ceremonial literature is disdainfully rejected, and it follows in this manner that alternatives which exclude one another both reach the truth as their term.

There is, however, yet another point of view, and it is of some moment, as it connects with that question of the Instituted Mysteries about which it has been already observed that very little has transpired. Most students of occultism are acquainted with intimations and rumours of the existence in modern times of more than one Occult as of more than one Mystical Fraternity, deriving, or believed to derive, from other associations of the past. There are, of course, many unaffiliated occultists, as most mystics are unaffiliated, but the secret Fraternities exist, and the keys of occult symbolism are said to be in their possession. From a variety of isolated statements scattered up and down the works of professed Occultists in recent years, it is possible to summarise broadly the imputed standpoint of these bodies in respect of Ceremonial Magic. I will express it in brief as follows. There is no extant Ritual, as there is no doctrine, which contains, or can possibly contain, the real secret of magical procedure or the essence of occult doctrine. The reason--whatever may be said in the excess of some self-constituted exponents--is not because there is, or can be, any indicible process, but because the knowledge in question is in the custody of those who have taken effectual measures for its protection; and though, from time to time, some secrets of initiation, belonging to this order, have filtered through printed books into the world at large, the real mysteries have never escaped. The literature of Magic falls, therefore, on this hypothesis, under three heads: (a.) The work of putative adepts, stating as much as could be stated outside the circle of initiation, and primarily designed to attract those who might be ripe for entrance. (b.) The speculations of independent seekers, who, by thought, study and intuition, sometimes attained veridic results without assistance. (c.) Travesties of occult doctrine, travesties of occult intention, travesties of occult procedure, complicated by filtrations from the superior source.

The opinions of professed occultists on any subject whatsoever are of no importance to myself, and are named only to establish a point of view; but most Ceremonial Magic belongs to the third class, on the assumption that it still exists, like some other paths of Satanism; the first, by its nature, is not represented, and the second only slightly. In a word, Ceremonial Magic reflects mainly the egregious ambitions and incorporates the mad processes of mediæval sorcery--of the Sabbath above all. The additional elements are debased applications of various Kabalistic methods, seering processes current among country people and fantastic attempts to reduce magical legends to a formal practice.

Whichever of the above views the reader may prefer to adopt, it will be seen that the net result as regards the Rituals is not generically different, that they are of literary and historical interest, but nothing further. For the occultist they will possess, from their associations, an importance which will be of no moment to another student. It is desirable that they should not be undervalued, as records of the past, because they have exercised an influence, and they are memorable as curiosities thereof; but it is more desirable still that the weak and credulous should be warned against acting like fools, and that those who are seeking spiritual certitude should be dissuaded from the science of the abyss.

Square "I" of ISMT. Fiery Lesser Angle of the Earth Tablet

Rehearsed the calls and the names, and visualized the pyramid. The 
pyramid for this square has north = earth, east = earth kerub = Taurus, 
west = earth of fire of earth = Princess of Wands, and south = fire.

I did not feel like I was getting much of response to the invocation. The 
pyramid was unclear, and would not focus despite repeated invocations, 
and the use of the letters and the pentagrams. 

I entered into the pyramid, and saw the sphinx. He had the head and 
upper body and legs of a bull, and the rear body and tail of a lion. But his 
front legs were actually arms, so that he looked a bit like a minotaur.

He responded in kind to the 5=6 signs, and added the 1=10 sign. The 
image was still weak and out of focus. I tried to ask him to take me to a 
place where I could see the power of the square, but the image kept 
fading in and out, and I could not get the point across. I heard a voice 
saying something about the "nature of the square", but I could not hear it 
clearly.

Since the session did not seem to be going well, I cut it off and returned to 
my astral temple. After closing the temple, I returned to my body and went 
to sleep.

(I concluded later that the vision failed because I had spent much of the 
afternoon considering the implications of the previous vision. I still had a 
residual "charge" from that vision that had to leak off before a new force 
could come in clearly.)

11/18/85

At work today, I began to get images related to the square, but they were 
still weak. There was also a sensation that some kind of written or spoken 
narrative was waiting for me to hear it or transcribe it. I wrote down a few 
things, and most of it seemed to relate more or less to this square, but it 
started to get into praises of my personal power as a magician. This type 
of message always makes me suspicious, since I had had cause to regret 
believing similar praise in the past.

The more coherent section of the notes began:

"I gave the 5=6 sign [to the sphinx] and he responded with the same and 
added the 1=10 and 4=7 signs. He said: 'Behold, O worshiper, you have 
reached the culmination of your journey. I have been formed to be your 
[untranslatable thought involving receptivity to creative impulses] and as 
my god are you worshiped in turn by all the elements.'"

"I questioned him about this comment but kept getting distracted by 
events in the office. From several repetitions on the sphinx's part, it 
seemed that he said 'You are now a creator in truth, and therefore you 
have rights of control over all the elements of the four Walls of Enoch. But 
I speaketh not of the Floor.'11 He seemed reluctant to say more.

"I asked the sphinx to show me a scene representative of the square. I 
saw a scene of great lushness, tropical, with the heat seeming to rise from 
the ground. We were in a field surrounded on three sides by jungle, 
thickest to the north as we faced, thinner on the left, and changing to 
savannah on the right. To the south, the savannah was burning steadily, 
without smoke but with fire covering everything from about 100 yards 
away to the horizon. Children or small sprites played in the thin jungle to 
the west. 

"The Bull led me through the trees to the north, to a clearing surrounded 
by hardwood trees. The soil of the clearing was rich and loamy, and 
looked as if it had just been turned for planting.

"The bull spoke and said that the earth was cleared, and ready for 
whatever impulse12 I chose to put into it. I asked what sort of impulse it 
had in mind, and why I should do such a thing. (A touch of paranoia 
inspired by his previous comments about my privileges.)

"He explained that as a creator, I had to demonstrate my creativity by 
putting a new thing into this world. My interpretation of Achad's cabala 
would be such a thing. If I wished such a creation to grow and continue to 
bear fruit, it must be planted as a fire in the earth.

"I asked if anything else could be planted there, and what sort of thing. He 
said that anything would do, so long as it came from my own mind. He 
had suggested my cabala as my most worthy creation. 

"I asked how to do it and was told to plant its image in the soil. I visualized 
Achad's version of the Tree of Life. With each path that I added, I tried to 
put in the flavor or quality that I associated with the essence of the path. 
With the Tree visualized as best I could, I concentrated the image in my 
ajna center, and then threw it out from myself to enlarge and stand above 
the soil.

"Saying, "May this Tree live forever, and cover all the earth with its glory.", 
I caused it to sink into the soil until it was gone from sight.

"The Bull rejoiced with a glad heart."

At this point, business in the office picked up, and I had to spend the rest 
of the day interviewing. I stuffed my notes away and forgot about it until 
evening. 

I did the invocations again beginning at 6:06 pm. I got a clear image of the 
pyramid, and also a clear image of the sphinx, who seemed decidedly 
bored with all these comings and goings. He nodded to me and gestured 
upwards with his nose. I tested him with the pentagram and letters, which 
seemed to strengthen him. But the vision did not seem to want to go any 
where. So I got up and transcribed the above account of the events up to 
date, and went to do a Tarot reading to see if it would shed any light on 
the matter.

The reading indicated specifically that it was my resistance to the praise in 
the vision that was keeping me from seeing it clearly, and that I should 
throw myself into it and let the resistance come after it was over, if it had 
to. The "Celtic Cross" spread was the one used, and in the position 
defining the querent, it indicated a man who was disappointed because 
what he had intended to be a simple teaching aid had ceased to be so. 
This was so close to the mark that I had to laugh.

While I was putting the cards away, I got an image of the Egyptian 
goddess who rules the square, Nepthys. She was wearing the Moon 
Crown, with black and white nemyss, collar, and tunic, and she had yellow 
skin.

She gestured to me and lead me into the forest to the north of the field in 
which we stood. I saw that it was the same field of this afternoon's vision, 
but that it was night now, and a new moon matching the real moon's 
phase was in the sky. Despite being just a sliver, the vision's moon put out 
enough light to see.

We traveled again to the clearing of the earlier visions. It looked the same 
as I approached it, but as soon as I entered, I was covered by a thick 
darkness, almost palpable. The faintest of red glows could be seen or felt 
within it. Growing nervous, I intended to call upon Nepthys, but the name 
that I called out was "Nuit!"13

Immediately the sky cleared and the darkness vanished. The first thing 
my eyes saw was the night sky, brilliant stars in blackness, seeming to 
loom down. I could feel that the sky was Nuit. A voice without words said 
"Yes, my child, I, the mother of all and the end of all, come upon you. The 
thick darkness that you saw, laced with faint red, is my special sign to you, 
with the feeling of my presence that it gives. You saw it once before when 
you emerged from the Tree [in The Beast and the Star]."

The sky loomed yet nearer, and in some way the dimensions twisted, so 
that the earth and myself interpenetrated with the field of stars. We 
seemed to be parsecs across, but at the same time we retained our 
normal small size on the cosmic scale.

I felt myself being drawn into the field of stars, changing my shape to the 
basic sphere, whose simple elegance rules in the macrocosm. My earthly 
self was partially shed, so that I was touched at a deeper level by the 
scene.

I noted that in some way the spirit of the earth had been drawn up with 
me, and was itself become as a star in that sky. She appeared first as I 
usually see her from space, blue and brown clothed in white, then I saw 
her on the astral level, shrouded in a cloud of noxious gases, only a few of 
which are material in nature. Then I saw her transformed, glowing brightly 
enough to outshine all else around her.  

(Throughout all this, I had simultaneously been seeing the earth as a 
planet and as a woman. In woman-phase, she appeared first as a mother 
about 25 years old, fully mature in body and young in outlook. The 
correspondence to the miasma-image was a woman who had been 
burdened with the karma of millions through no fault of her own. In her 
transformation, she shed the dark, murky stew of emotions in which she 
had been clothed, She appeared young and bright, but with a knowledge 
so deep that it had made her innocent again.  

I marveled at the beauty of this young woman, though I can not describe it 
at all now beyond saying that she seemed to be all things at once. And 
even more I marveled that I was connected to her in some way that made 
me feel married. On thinking about this, it seemed reasonable. Earth 
certainly knows at least as much about me as a wife does about her 
husband. And, reversing it, my own knowledge of her, so very much less, 
was about equal to the average husband's knowledge of his wife. The 
connection between us felt very good, with an undercurrent of love given 
unconditionally. Love fairly shone from her and blinded me until I turned 
away.)

Nuit said, again without words, "This shall regenerate the world, the little 
world my sister, my heart & my tongue, unto whom I send this kiss."14

I was then sent a burst of information, and it took a while to untangle it all. 

It was the success of myself and my fellow magicians that "regenerated" 
the world. Every time one human being became fully aware of his/her 
star-ness, it raised the spiritual level of the being that enlivened the earth 
as well. 

In incarnating as the earth, this being had deliberately cut herself off from 
communion with her fellows among the stars. She had voluntarily "entered 
a prison of the flesh" in order to set the conditions necessary for her own 
next initiation. In doing so, she had also made herself the garbage dump 
for all the negative emotional matter in this sector of space.  

Receiving all this emotional matter served dual purposes. In relation to the 
earth herself, it enabled her to perform a "service" for her "community", 
loosely speaking, while at the same time undergoing a trial necessary to 
her advancement. The act was a service because it gave certain other 
stellar beings in the neighborhood, notably the star Set (Sirius or Sothis), 
a clean environment in which to undergo his next initiation, and to perform 
certain other magickal tasks. 

Now, to get out of this condition, it is necessary for the earth to have a 
certain number of fully conscious beings living in her, who are aware of 
their place in the larger cosmos. When these beings throw their 
consciousness outside the earth's aura, they punch holes in the blanket of 
emotional matter surrounding the earth. These holes continue to expand 
so long as the person maintains some connection within the earth's 
sphere. Each hole allows energy and information from the outside to get 
back to the earth's Life. Thus, she gains strength she needs to disperse 
the cloud, and material of the proper grade for her own growth.

And since each adept's consciousness is reflected in her own, the 
increased vibrations of the adept's awareness also raises her own state of 
consciousness slightly, further helping her to regain her lost state.

When the needed number of adepts are fully linked into the outer 
universe, then the earth can use their paths as a route to send her whole 
awareness out. From outside the material aura of the planet, she can take 
direct action to disperse the emotional miasma, and those beings who live 
on earth because of it. With the Air again clear, then balance will be 
restored to the relations between the kingdoms on earth, and man will find 
his place as its caretaker.

Thus, the initiations of individuals do good to the earth simply by having 
happened. Their continued existence on earth continues the good, so 
long as their knowledge of their place as stars in the womb of Nuit also 
continues. They need do nothing else but pursue their own wills. This is 
why it is a lie that sacrifice is necessary to initiation, and a lie that the 
initiated have a duty to spread their knowledge. 

Nuit bent down and enveloped myself and the earth in an embrace that 
was inside us as well as about us. It definitely felt like a kiss despite 
enclosing us completely. Then I returned to the clearing where we started, 
and the earth spirit went back into her body.

I looked about the clearing and wondered if I should close the vision or 
continue. A voice told me to wait a moment. I took the opportunity to go to 
the bathroom. It had taken a while to sort out what that burst of 
information had in it, and it was now 8:10 pm. I am certain that I have 
forgotten a lot of what was in the burst. For a while, ideas had gone by so 
fast that they were replaced by another before the could be absorbed.

I returned to the clearing. It was still and quiet. The moon seemed to have 
gone lower in the western sky, and there was not as much light. What little 
there was faded quickly, leaving me again in full darkness.

I heard: "You have invoked the powers of the fire of earth. And as we 
have told you, we have given to you in full measure. For is not the being 
who is the life of Earth ultimately the true fire of earth? Did she not inject 
herself into the body of earth as in the square "T", cutting herself off from 
her kind in order to bring life to the world? And did not her life disperse 
throughout the earth, as in the square "M", feeding every living creature, 
maintaining order of types and functions among them? And did not you, 
her creature, under the pressure of her life, become transformed from an 
amorphous lump into a Star? And is this not the reward of all the adepts 
upon her? And did you not see yourself, a Star of fire15, married to her 
within my field? And is not the heart of your soul, your own creation, now 
buried in her to grow and reproduce? Thus ye have made her the Bride, 
and IHVH is fulfilled within the Fiery Lesser Angle." 

Abruptly, the vision ended, and all sense of connection was gone. I went 
and finished this account of the vision, which I end here at 10:10pm.
-----------------------------------------------------

Notes and comments: (1985)

When I started this series of astral visions, it was only with the thought of 
doing something interesting with some unexpected free time. Square "T" 
was picked on a moment's impulse. It was only after the vision that I 
thought about invoking the other squares in the series. 

The experience of the first vision brought to mind one of the things that 
has annoyed me about published accounts of the Enochian squares. That 
is, these accounts all seemed haphazard. Squares were picked at 
random, and no effort was made to show the squares in their relation to 
the rest of the Tablet. While this might be satisfactory for demonstrating 
astral projection techniques, it did not do justice to the complexity or 
quality of the system. I decided to do a series of projections for related 
squares of one of the Tablets. The one I had just done seemed an ideal 
starting point.

All the squares in this series are what is known as "kerubic" squares. 
There are four in each of the lesser angles of each tablet, and they direct 
the operations of the sixteen subservient squares of the Angle. Their 
position and function make them an embodiment of the overall powers of 
the Angle.

The formula of IHVH determines most of the attributions in the tablets. 
Each of the kerubic squares is related to one letter of IHVH, as their name 
implies. Since each Lesser Angle and each Tablet is also related to one of 
the letters, we have three levels of interaction with the name. So under 
this system, the square "T" represents Fire of Fire of Earth, square "M" is 
Water of Fire of Earth, and so on. This symbolism is fairly clear in the 
visions.

By the time I started on the square "M", I had a whole plan lined out for 
doing the visions, analyzing the symbolism, and showing the interrelations 
between them. Nothing more was expected of the visions than a more-or-
less formal presentation of symbolic correspondences, and their relation 
to everyday events and objects. This was all I had gotten out of the 
system up till then, and there seemed no reason to expect anything 
different. 

After the second vision, this was still my intent. But after the first of the 
invocations for the square "S", I began to get feelings that things were 
getting out of hand. There was an impression that someone had co-opted 
my little project and that I was no longer in control of it. This is to be 
expected when a higher force is invoked, but the Elemental Tablets had 
always seemed to relate to the forces operating in the mundane world, 
which are normally under the magician's control.

The manner in which the vision of square "S" occurred verified that 
something more than my own will was involved in creating the vision. 
First, much of it occurred without my normal consciousness being 
involved. It appears that my magickal self was isolated from my mundane 
persona for the vision, and the persona only remembered it after the fact. 
Second, the events of the vision occurred in a way that defies normal 
concepts of experiential time. Certain sections are remembered as having 
happened one at a time, and yet they are also remembered as happening 
simultaneously. I had experienced this effect before, but not in cases 
involving such a large amount of information.

The twisted-time effect was even more pronounced in square "I". The 
vision occurred in a way that was not at all serial. Instead, it appeared as 
a complete creation in four dimensions, and was only translated into a 
serial-time mode after the fact.

I would like to point out that the visions continued to follow the attributions 
of the squares invoked despite the change of approach and scope in the 
latter two visions. Beyond this, they speak for themselves. 

You may have noticed that the starting and stopping times of the visions 
include a large number of symmetric numbers. This was not deliberate. 
My unconscious is attracted to these numbers, and frequently arranges 
events in this way. There is no particular occult meaning involved.

The Square "S" of ISMT of the Fiery Lesser Angle of the Earth Tablet.

I vibrated the calls and the names, and visualized the pyramid. For a few 
moments, I got an image of rapidly blowing air, the movement being 
generated by heat from fires below. However, the heat did not reach up to 
the level where I was, which was cool.

Above me I saw the sphere of the earth looming down towards me, but 
the sense of gravity was pulling towards the fire and not the earth. There 
was an impression of many angels or beings flashing by me, but I could 
not see them clearly, only a silvery-white or yellow blur. It seemed that 
they were moving too fast to see. But some of them would stop for just a 
split-second to look at me, and by the time the images of them registered, 
they would be gone again. 

The "afterimages" from these brief stops let me see that they were 
wearing diaphanous white or yellow gowns, much like the usual T-cross 
magician's robe, but with two or three additional layers of sheer cloth that 
blew in the wind. They seemed to have dark faces with blonde hair, and a 
sharp but delicate bone structure.  The eyes were wide, dark, and serious.

At the time I did not consciously see more than this. The last thing I recall 
hearing was a voice saying "What the force of the square "T" conceals 
and encysts, here I disperse." 

I couldn't seem to get a clearer picture, or to get another image, so I 
returned to my body, thinking that the attempt had failed, and that it would 
have to be done over again. Yet there was sense of things unfinished. I 
felt restless. The body wanted to move around and do something active. 
My mind felt relaxed and free of pressures, but unable to focus, or to 
produce the idea for something to do.  And despite this feeling, there was 
a pressure on the top of the head that was giving me a tension headache. 
(All this obviously relates to the forces of the pyramid. Fire at the bottom, 
air in the middle, and earth at the top.)

Sometimes such feelings indicate that there is a message to be passed to 
me by automatic writing. I had learned this talent early, and had 
developed it to the point where it was actually automatic typing using my 
word-processor, often at faster speed than I can type consciously.

I sat down at the processor, and got just a little bit of message. The being 
identified himself as NSITM, the archangel ruling this square of the tablet. 
He said that he had come to tell me all about the kerubic squares of this 
lesser angle. He began an introductory sentence, and then the sense of 
contact was cut off completely. There was no impression that the 
intelligence was still around.

The restless feelings reappeared. I did a banishing, hoping this would at 
least tone down the power of it. In spite of the banishings, this feeling of 
the power of the square continued for most of the day. I felt both mentally 
dispersed and physically restless until evening, when an additional 
banishing caused them to cease. 

But in writing this down the next day, I found that I remembered a great 
deal more than I had seen at the time. The events described below were 
not consciously experienced, but in writing this account they appeared to 
me as a memory of an event that had actually happened. I can not 
distinguish it from the memory of other visions that I did have consciously. 
The only thing that convinces me now that I did not see it consciously is 
my memory of doing other things at the time, and being totally unaware of 
such a vision occurring. Apparently the vision continued at some level of 
my mind without my attention.

After the fact, I recall seeing a picture of a great white cliff. The ground 
extending back from the top of the cliff was black. Along the face of this 
cliff, a large number of angels worked, hurriedly bringing things, and 
taking things away. I could not see clearly what they brought7, but it went 
into the cliff face and was buried in the earth. The angels took away great 
pieces of the cliff itself, which looked crystalline from a closer viewpoint. 
These pieces they scattered about the surface of the earth, producing life 
in great variety. Everywhere a piece fell, new life arose into being. Each 
new life was actually a whole planet somewhere in the cosmos, with its 
entire systems of animals, plants and intelligent beings.

And an angel said to me: "The cycle of life in the earth is controlled by 
these squares of the lesser angle of fire, in the Wall of Earth. First, in the 
square "T", is the life injected into the potential of being by the will of the 
gods. It takes on the quality of earth, and therefore does its flashing 
brightness bemoan its loss of self. But without its loss, the earth were 
mere dead matter, inert and without possibility of form. 

"In the square "M" is the life spread throughout the earth. Where the fires 
of "T" were encapsulated as it were, so the waters of "M" do leach the life 
from its capsule, and spread it throughout the base-matter, making it living 
and receptive to the thoughts of the gods. Under the pressure from the 
earth above, this life-infested matter changes to a crystalline form. Each 
unit of crystal possesses the full capabilities of the original life-impulse, 
with the added ability to produce more life-crystals without loss to itself."8

(I noted in passing that while the individual units had a crystalline form, 
they did appear to have some inherent flexibility. There was also a vitality 
to them, an impression that one body was not enough to hold their force. 
They were ready to multiply at any instant. When the crystals were in 
groups, they bunched together in a way that reminded me of muscle 
fibers, so that individual crystals could slide around a bit without losing 
place in the group.)

I asked the angel why my vision of the square "M" had not revealed this. 
The angel replied that it did, but that I had misinterpreted what I saw. The 
drops of glowing fire on the cliff face of that vision were the encapsulated 
lives of the square "T". They fell into the waters, where they were 
dispersed and distributed throughout the earth. The metallic flakes in the 
water were the dissolved lives of "T". The waters were called the "Waters 
of Death", both because of the Scorpio connection and because to the 
lives it did indeed appear as a form of death, that is, a disruption of their 
unity. The steam of the meeting of fire and water in that vision produced 
the air in which the angel and I were presently standing. The fact that the 
square "M" was a transitional form accounted for the were-creature and 
the other references to retained characteristics.

He also mentioned that if I had used the main attributes, I would have 
seen the flakes of life come out of the water greatly expanded. Each 
would have been equal to the original drops of fire, and be blown 
westward into the square "S". Thus the life multiplied itself out of the 
energy of matter. I would also have seen that they emerged from their 
bath with an aspect of hardness and sharpness that they did not have 
before. The waters are the waters of the Styx, and they are armored like 
Achilles from the water's touch. But having been bathed fully, they have 
known Death and will no longer feel the touch of his arrow.

The angel continued: "These processes are ever continuous, so that the 
crystals of life must be moved from their place, to make way for yet more 
life. Here in the square "S", we take the encapsulated lives of the square 
"T", and place them in the richest parts of the earth. In return, we take the 
crystals of life that are extruded from the cliff face, and we scatter them 
across the universe, so that the gods will have many canvasses upon 
which to work their art."

The angel showed me the scattering of the life-crystals. The material 
universe is seen as a great plane of energy from this square. It is in fact 
the field of flames that caused the air to move at the beginning of the 
vision. This energy in great abundance is everywhere ideal for the 
seeding of life, for it can do nothing of itself, but must have the impulse of 
life to bring it into form. 

Within the field, there are stresses that dictate that life take one form or 
another in order to move there. Incompatible forms are destroyed quickly, 
because they can not assimilate the kinds of energy available. I saw the 
angels take the life-crystal lumps they carried, and cut them into pieces 
that matched the stresses in a particular area. Then they would place the 
pieces carefully, so that the lines of stress in the area were aligned with 
the striations of the crystals. Leftover pieces were shaped to fill the 
stressed area to its full limits. The angel told me that this activity caused 
all the niches in the ecology to be filled with appropriate life.

Each piece so placed began to radiate like a sun, even brighter than the 
fires in which it lay. The light increased as the fires themselves began to 
take on the pattern and radiance of the crystals. It was said: "Thus does 
life create order, out of the chaos of universal energy. Through its very 
existence, it demands that the energy of the material world take on orderly 
forms. Not only within the limits of its own area, but extending by its 
radiance to other areas that have no life of their own. Its living beings 
become gods, and the agents of gods, making the creation in matter."

Without pause, the angel went on: "In coming to these squares, you 
sought knowledge of the enochian worlds, and of the powers thereof. We 
have given you in full measure what we have here, and will give more as 
you explore the last of our squares,"I". That you have not seen all that is 
here is certain, for as you know no man will see even a fraction of the 
whole. Even the gods rejoice in such unknowing, for it allows the 
possibility of Discovery. Yet we have given, and will give to the extent of 
our natures. Such as you come rarely to this world, who seek solely for 
understanding and knowledge, and hope for power only over self. To you 
we may give all that we have, all that we know, all that we be. Let your will 
go forth to continue this search, and your reward will be as the heavens 
made manifest."9

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * 

(The piece that follows occurred simultaneous with, but separate from, the 
Angel's speech in this vision. It is the same theme played in a different 
key. The ways in which they harmonize will be left, as they say, as an 
exercise for the reader.)


At the same time as the angel spoke, I saw the primordial universe, 
divided into light and dark. The light and dark were separated along a 
plane that extended to infinity. There was no way to understand the size 
of what I saw, as there was nothing else in the image to compare it with. 
The dark appeared to be a solid wall. There was no intermixture with the 
light.

I looked more closely at the wall, comparing it with the light in which I 
stood, and understood that it was not truly dark. The two sides were 
interchangeable. If I had been on the other side, that side would have 
looked light and this side dark. 

An angel at my side told me that the light and dark were energy and 
matter. Matter is energy turned inside out. The interface between light and 
dark was actually at the level of what would be Tiphereth when the 
universe was created. All of the matter of the lower planes belongs to the 
other side. He emphasized again that if I were on the other side the 
situation would look exactly the same, but with that side being in the light.

The light side, while clearly full of energy, was totally transparent. It had 
no characteristics of any kind that could be seen. 

Suddenly a stream of light shot down towards the wall from behind me. As 
it hit the wall and passed through it shattered into a multitude of small, 
independent and self-sustaining units of energy. 

These units drew a shell of matter around themselves, so that they could 
barely be seen. Their energy interpenetrated to the surface of the shell. 
Eventually all the energy gathered into the shell, leaving the center 
hollow. (I was told that the deepest point in matter reached by the 
descending beam was Malkuth of the Tree.) 

Matter tried to eject these shells, since they were a disturbance of its 
normal motion. It could not do so, but its attempts put a steady pressure 
on the shells. Forcing the shells into a smaller area caused their energy to 
be concentrated, bringing them to a higher state of awareness.

With this increased awareness, the lives withdrew some of their 
substance from the shell, and concentrated it in their centers. The 
concentration of energy caused a rotary field of some sort to be 
generated around each shell. The matter was seen to have an innate 
rotation that was exactly opposite to that of the unit's. This opposition of 
fields caused the pressure on the units to increase tremendously. Each 
unit was forced to concentrate more of its energy in its center to maintain 
its integrity. But at the same time, the interaction of the fields generated 
even more energy, so that the units could add all the new energy they 
needed.

This additional energy helped fill the center and support the shell against 
matter. But the pressure also increased, in a kind of feedback loop, so 
that one process encouraged the other, which in turn encouraged the first. 
The units of energy became steadily brighter and stronger within their 
shells. 

Eventually some of the units found they could discard their shells 
altogether, and maintain themselves against matter's pressure solely 
through their own energetic counterpressure. The frictional effects of the 
two fields continued to generate more energy within the units, allowing 
them to continue expanding.

Since the units were not imbedded too deeply in matter, some of them 
eventually expanded to the degree that their bubbles of counterpressure 
broke through the surface of matter and back out into the light. Their own 
pressure caused them to be blown out through the holes they made, and 
into the light. Most of them immediately withdrew back into matter, but 
with several such experiences they moved out permanently, while 
maintaining their connection with matter in order to keep generating the 
energy they needed to expand.

The area covered by their connections to matter expanded as they did. 
Eventually, both the units and their connections expanded until they were 
lost out of sight, and there was nothing to indicate that they had ever been 
there. But the entire visible area was now just a small area within one 
unit's connecting cord, so the appearance of emptiness was false.

A voice said: This is how the gods reproduce. All gods are positive, and 
therefore can not mate with each other and produce a new entity on their 
own level. So they follow the ancient way, and throw parts of themselves 
into matter, there to disintegrate into the motes you saw. It is essential 
that they go through matter, for this is their source of independent life and 
had this not been done, the extended energy would return to its god and 
meld with his being again. Reproduction would fail.

"These motes are the souls of those who became men and women. Both 
[sexes] are positive with respect to matter, and both have potential to 
become gods again. There is no difference between them. [The emphasis 
is the speaker's, not the scribe's.] Some break their shells early, giving joy 
to their parent. Others stay encysted until the end of the world, when they 
are drawn out of matter whether or not they wish."

(Somewhere in all the above, it was pointed out that an entity on the side 
of things that saw our matter as light and our light as matter, would see 
exactly the same process going on from his side. The sparks sent into 
their matter would appear in our world as energy shooting from Malkuth to 
Tiphereth, and then spending all their time trying to force their way back 
into Malkuth again. These entities are known to us as demons. Of course, 
the demons think we are the demons.)

The two visions merged at the point where the angel said "In coming to 
these squares. . .".

A Vision of the Square "M" of of ISMT of the Fiery Lesser Angle of the Earth Tablet.

This square is the one immediately to the left of the square used in the
above vision. While still in the fiery sub-element of the Earth Tablet, its
north, south, east, and west sides are attributed to Earth, Fire, Scorpio,
and the Queen of Wands, respectively. There are still two parts fire in the
square, but one of the previous fire sides has turned to water. It also is
attributed to Heh of IHVH.

I visualized the pyramid of the square standing in the middle of my astral
temple. As I did so, the temple darkened, and the pyramid became more
clearly visible. The top was black with the letter Tal (M) in white. The north
side had the four-color Enochian emblem of Earth on a black background.
The east became dark blue with the Eagle kerub in orange-yellow. On the
south, the simple triangle of fire in red. The west side showed Crowley's
version of the Queen of Wands, the fiercely imperious woman and her
leopard mascot. 4

The fiery sides of the pyramid flashed from red to green to red again. I
gave the sign of the Enterer and passed into the pyramid, giving the sign
of Silence when centered in it.

The sphinx was there. It had the head of a wild ox or buffalo, the
forequarters of the Lion, the hindquarters of the Eagle, and the tail of the
lion.5 Given the 5=6 sign, it responded with the same signs, and added
the signs of Earth and Water6. The sphinx stood up on its hind legs and
leaped up into the beam emanating from the top of the pyramid. I
sounded the divine names of the square again, and followed the sphinx
up through the beam.

I rose up the planes for a while without encountering any cohesive
images. Suddenly I came out into a dark scene. The background of the
scene consisted of a mountain range, beginning out of sight to my right,
and continuing south for some miles before turning east. After crossing to
the east, the range tapered down to a promontory. This tongue of land
stuck out into a dark sea that filled the rest of the east. From behind the
mountains to the south rose clouds, covering the sky.

In front of the mountains, an inlet of the sea protruded across the picture,
up to the base of the western mountains. The water was a very dark
grayish-brown, with an oily sheen to the surface.

The foreground of the scene was a hard, cold rock shelf or shield, with
nothing growing on it. When I turned around, the scene to the north simply
faded into blackness. The ground had a slick feel to it.

I went forward to examine the water. It was no more clear from close up,
although I could see that most of its opacity came from suspended
particles. The particles looked almost like silver metalflake paint. The
surface of the water was slightly convex where it touched the shore,
becoming higher the farther you went from shore.

I was invited to stick my hand in the water. I did so quickly and pulled it
out again. I could see the oiliness and a thin coating of the metalflakes on
my hand. Then the flesh all dissolved, leaving the bare bones. This
dissolving continued on up the arm until I shook it, after which the flesh
came back. I either thought, or heard someone say, "The Waters of
Death".

Looking to the west, I tried to see what was at the end of the inlet. The
shore could not be seen due to clouds of steam or mist. But farther up the
cliff, there seemed to be drops of glowing orange liquid seeping or
sweating through the rock. When I tried to see more detail, that area of
the scene dimmed.

I then noted that there was a glow reflecting from the clouds to the south.
The source of light seemed to be behind the mountains. I rose up until I
could see what was there. To the west and south appeared a great sea of
fire, orange-red. In the western area, the fire moved in visible currents. To
the south, it was a flaming field.

Where the fire met the water in the east, great billows of steam arose, to
become the clouds visible from the north. The two elements completely
balanced each other, so that there was always just enough water flowing
south to stop the fire from getting to the north and east. They met at an
unwavering line that stretched to the horizon.

Moving back above the mountains, I examined the fire more closely.
There was an impression that the fire was under great pressure to cross
the mountains into the north. It rose up in waves, higher and higher into
the sky, but there seemed to be an invisible barrier above the mountains,
and it could not pass them. It fell back.

I asked to see the animal related to the square, and was shown a sort of
were-creature in the process of changing from a large fish to a bull. The
front half had the torso and head of the minotaur, and the bottom half was
the rear half of a fish. The fire aspect seemed completely absent, until I
noticed or was told that the fire was the transformation itself.

It was then pointed out that the animal was frozen in the middle of its
transformation, and that this "freezing" was a function of the power of the
square. I gathered that it controlled the retention of neonatal
characteristics in otherwise mature organisms. The human retention of
the relative hairlessness of the newborn is an example of this. It also
controls cases in which a species that goes through metamorphoses as
part of the maturation process begins to stop itself at some point before
the final metamorphosis occurs. No species was given for this second
effect.

I asked to see the power of the square as it acted in the mineral kingdom.
I was shown a place in the Pacific Trench, very deep, where lava flowed
out of a vent in the side of the trench. The pressure is so great that the
water does not explode when the hot lava hits it. Only a thin layer of
steam is produced between them, and the water carries off the heat from
the steam, cooling the lava and stopping its advance.

For an example of this force in the plant kingdom, I was shown a
microscopic view of the pistil of a flower. The pistil was a long stem full of
microscopic tubules. As I watched, a grain of pollen came down one
tubule and united with an egg cell. Behind this first grain, more grains tried
to come down the tube, but the tube was closed off by being filled with
sap before they could get close to the egg. This closing of the passage is
the function of the square's force. In the human being, a similar process
goes on when the fertilized egg grows a thick outer membrane
immediately after the first sperm cell enters it.

The type of person represented by the square was a woman, with a body
that appeared wide when viewed from the front or back, but looked thin
from the side. The upper face was square, with a triangular jaw line. The
hair was dark brown with blonde highlights. The skin was also tanned
dark. Her dress was an absurd collection of red and blue polka dots on a
black base. I could not get a strong impression of the temperament of this
person.

As an example of the force acting in human society, I was shown an
image of two groups of people acting at cross-purposes. I got the
impression that this was not interference of an active or willful type.
Instead, the two groups blocked each other "by surprise", in ways that do
not directly relate to the function of either. An ambulance having its route
blocked by a Shriner's parade, for instance.

The vision seemed to be weakening at this point, so I returned to my
temple and banished the forces. I then returned to my body.

A vision of the Square "T" of ISMT of the Fiery Lesser Angle of the Earth Tablet.

I had determined to do an exploration of a square of an Enochian tablet 
following the directions and system described by Regardie in The Golden 
Dawn. I selected a square from the Earth tablet, "T" or "M"1, the rightmost 
kerubic square of the Fiery Lesser Angle. 

I derived the appropriate divine names for invoking the square, and 
constructed the pyramid in the imagination. The north side and top 
colored black, the other three visible sides colored red. I imagined the 
kerub being hidden within the pyramid, and a ray of light descending to or 
ascending from the pyramid.2

I performed the sign of the Enterer, and went into the pyramid. As this 
happened, the sides attributed to Fire changed from red to the flashing 
color, green. On the inside, the walls changed from green to red. I saw the 
sphinx of the sub-element, which had the head of a bull and the body, 
legs, and tail of the male lion. I gave the 5=6 signs, and tested him with 
the letters, at which he seemed to expand while maintaining shape. This 
indicated he was genuine.

I invited the sphinx to take me to a place where I could see the effect of 
this square in nature. Immediately we went to a place far underground, 
where a river of fire was being constricted and pushed back by a wall or 
barrier of rock. It seemed to be as if the fire was sealed off in a round 
space entirely surrounded by cold rock. I was told that the effect of the 
square had to do with the encapsulation of a force, all-potent within its 
own sphere of action, by a slower force acting on a larger scale. The wall 
of rock could be seen to move very slowly, forcing the fire into a smaller 
space.

An example was shown. We went to the western edge of the United 
States, and to the subduction zone where the edge of the Pacific tectonic 
plate was forced down underneath the edge of the continent. Despite its 
great melting heat, the molten rock of the mantle is pushed back down by 
the edge of the plate.

As another example I was taken to a Kimberlite pipe in Africa. These 
"pipes" are the cooled remains from an action like that of the square. The 
hot material had been cut off from the mantle and forced close to the 
surface by immense pressure from the surrounding rock. The combination 
of heat and pressure caused the formation of carbon crystals, diamonds, 
in the pipe.

I asked to see the spiritual animal of the square. Only gnomes were 
shown. The gnomes all had stubby arms and legs, and heads elongated 
from front to back until they were almost football-shaped. The short limbs 
and the shape of the head allowed them to move very quickly (in a 
horizontal position) along very small tunnels in the rock. They appeared to 
be strong.

I vibrated the name of the god of the square, Horus. (He is god because 
the square has three fiery sides, despite being in the tablet of Earth). 
Horus appeared, and I gave him the 5=6 signs. He responded with the 
same signs, then added the signs of 1=10 and 4=7. I judged this to be 
reasonable since these are the signs of earth and fire, represented by this 
square.

Horus showed me the sphinx of the square again, but his varied from 
mine in that the head was that of a buffalo with a fringe of hair along the 
jaw-line. The body was more elongated than the sphinx who guided me, 
like a cheetah, and of a reddish-orange color. The head was black that 
turned a dark glowing green, like the shine on beetle's wings, where it was 
highlighted.3

Horus said: "Bemoan me, o worshiper, for though I am truly the god of 
this pyramid, yet my own powers have come to naught in this place. The 
fire is ever smothered by the greater earth, and here my force and fire are 
leached from me."

He appeared to have nothing more to say, so I requested to see the type 
of man represented by the square. I was shown a large, thick-headed 
man with a square brow and dark hair. His body was like that of a 
wrestler, or like that of the God Mars, and he wore nothing but a loincloth. 
The skin was colored dark brown, but the features were caucasian. I got 
the impression that this man was stolid and determined, and that he got 
his way in life by forcing himself into the position he wanted, and then 
refusing to move from it until everyone else accepted the fait accompli. He 
is lacking in any really demonstrative characteristics, but has the slow but 
unremitting force of a glacier.

In the plant kingdom, this square controls the lives of seeds buried in 
permafrost or hard ground, and also the way in which roots of plants force 
their way into tiny cracks in rock.

In the animal kingdom, the force was shown me in those mammals that 
bury themselves for the winter, and in insects that store their eggs in 
underground capsules while they hatch.

I asked to see the effect in human society, and was shown a group of 
persons entering a cave for purposes of worship. They did so because the 
ground insulated them from the influences of other living things, allowing 
them to concentrate an unusually large amount of pure god-force without 
having it leak away. 

In the human arts, the square relates to the use of pigments produced by 
burning or roasting certain minerals.

On a cosmic scale, the square shares with others the responsibility for the 
formation of a cold crust on molten, recently-formed planets.
 
It was pointed out to me that the entire column of squares governed by 
this square also had a part to play in the details of the processed 
described. At this point, I felt I was getting tired, so I ended the vision and 
returned to my body.

I closed the temple by banishing the forces.