MAGICIAN

THE MAGICIAN

 

VERY shortly after the ceremony of Adeptus Minor, P. returned to his fastness to carry out the great Magical Operation of Abramelin the Mage, the preliminary preparations of which he had for so long now been setting in order.

Unfortunately we have ben scanty information of P.’s daily life during these days, and all that is recorded is to be found in a small book of some twenty pages entitled, “The Book of the Operation of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage.

(Being the account of the events of my life, with notes on the operation by P., an humble Aspirant thereto.)”

This slight volume commences with “The Oath of the Beginning,” after which it is roughly divided into three parts. The first deals with the events of his life between the beginning of November 1899 and the end of February 1900; the second with the Abramelin Operation; and the third with the transactions P. had with Frater D.D.C.F. 

From the first part of this work we gather that great forces of evil were leagued against P.; and we learn this with no very great surprise, for those who set their faces against Darkness must expect Darkness to attempt to swallow them

1. The Exempt Adept may laugh equally at good or at evil, but not so the mere magician whose passage along the Path of Light is only to be marked by the increasing depths of the Darkness which surrounds him.

 

It will be remembered that in the autumn of 1898 P. had

met Frater V.N., who had lent him a copy of a book known as

“The Book of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage,” and

had to some degree instructed him in the workings contained

in it. This work P. had read and reread with the greatest

interest and zeal, determining to perform the ceremonial

operation laid down in it at the very first opportunity. This he

was unable to do for nearly a year; it being not until

November 1899 that he found it possible for him to retire to

the house he had bought and make all necessary preparations

for the great ceremony, which was to be commenced on the

following Easter.

 

The system, as taught by Abramelin, of entering into

communication with one's Holy Guardian Angel, is, of all

Western systems of Magic, perhaps the most simple and

effective. No impossible demands are made, and though

perhaps some are difficult to carry out, there is always a reason

for them, and they are not merely placed in the way as tests of

the worker's skill. The whole Operation is so lucidly dealt

with in Mr. MacGregor Mathers' translation, that it would be

but a waste of time and space to enter into it fully, and the

following consists of but the briefest summary, only intended

to give the reader an idea of the Operation, and in no way

meant as a basis for him to work on.

 

Abramelin having first carefully warned his readers

against impostors, lays down that the chief thing to be considered

is: “Whether ye be in good health, because the body

being feeble and unhealthy, it is subject to divers infirmities

whence at length result impatience and want of power to

operate and pursue the Operation; and a sick man can neither

be clean and pure, nor enjoy solitude; and in such a case it is

better to cease.”*

 

The true and best time of commencing this Operation is

the first day after the Celebration of the Feasts of Easter at

about the time of the vernal Equinox. The time necessary for

the working is six months, so that should it be commenced on

March 22, it would end on September 21.

 

The six months is divided into three periods of two months each.

 

First Period. “Every morning precisely a quarter of an hour before sunrise enter your

Oratory, after having washed and dressed yourself in clean clothing, open the window,

and then kneel at the Altar facing the window and invoke the Name of the Lord; after

which you should confess to him your entire sins. This being finished you should supplicate

Him “that in time to come He may be willing and pleased to regard you with

pity and grant you His grace and goodness to send unto you His Holy Angel, who

shall serve unto you as a Guide. . . .Ӡ

 

In the above exercise by prayer the one great point to

observe, as Abramelin himself impresses in the following

words, is: “It serveth nothing to speak without devotion,

without attention, and without intelligence . . . it is absolutely

necessary that your prayer should issue from the midst of your

heart, because simply setting down prayers in writing, the

hearing of them will in no way explain unto you how really to pray.”‡

 

At sunset the same invocation, confession and prayer is to be repeated.

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* “The Book of the Sacred Magic,” p. 54.

† Ibid. p. 64. Some of the following quotations have been abriged.

‡ Ibid. p. 65.

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During this first period the points to be observed are:

 

(1) That both the bed-chamber and Oratory are to be kept thoroughly clean. “Your

whole attention must be given to purity in all things.”

(2) That “you may sleep with your Wife in the bed when she is pure and clean,” not otherwise.

(3) Every Saturday the sheets of the bed are to be changed and the chamber is to be perfumed.

(4) No animal is to enter or dwell in the house.

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* “The Book of the Sacred Magic,” pp. 66-69.

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(5) “If you be your own Master, as far as lieth in your power, free yourself from all

your business, and quit all mundane and vain company and conversation; leading a life

tranquil, solitary and honest.”

(6) “Take well heed in treating of business, in selling or buying, that it shall be

requisite that you never give way unto anger, but be modest and patient in your actions.”

(7) “You shall set apart two hours each day after having dined, during which you

shall read with care the Holy Scripture and other Holy Books.”

(8) “As for eating, drinking and sleeping, such should be in moderation and never superfluous.”

(9) “Your dress should be clean but moderate, and according to custom. Flee all vanity.”

(10) “As for that which regardeth the family, the fewer in number, the better; also act so that

the servants may be modest and tranquil.”

(11) “Let your hand be ever ready to give alms and other benefits to your neighbour; and let

your heart be ever open unto the poor, whom God so loveth that one cannot express the same.”*

 

Second Period. During the whole of this period the accustomed prayer is to be made

morning and evening, “but before entering into the Oratory ye shall wash your hands

and face thoroughly with pure water. And you shall prolong your prayer with the

greatest possible affection, devotion and submission; humbly entreating the Lord God

that he would deign to command His Holy Angels to lead you in the True Way. ...”

 

During this period the points to be observed are:

 

(1) “The use of the rites of Marriage is permitted, but should scarcely if at all be

made use of.”

(2) “You shall also wash your whole body every Sabbath Eve.”

(3) “As to what regardeth commerce and rules of living, as in the first period.”

(4) “It is absolutely necessary during this period to retire from the world and seek

retreat.”

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* “The Book of the Sacred Magic,” pp. 66-69.

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(5) “Ye shall lengthen your prayers to the utmost of your ability.”

(6) “As for eating, drinking, and clothing, as before.”*

Third Period. Morning and Noon ye shall wash your hands and your face on

entering the Oratory; and first ye shall make Confession of all your sins; after this,

with a very ardent prayer, ye shall entreat the Lord to accord unto you this particular

grace, which is, that you may enjoy and be able to endure the presence and conversation

of His Holy Angels, and that He may deign by their intermission to grant unto you

the Secret Wisdom, so that you may be able to have dominion over the Spirits and

over all creatures.

“Ye shall do this same at midday before dining and also in the evening,”† as well

as at sunrise.

 

During this period the points to be observed are:

 

(1) “The man who is his own master shall leave all business alone, except works of

charity towards his neighbour.”

(2) “You shall shun all society except that of your Wife and of your Servants.”

(3) “Ye shall employ the greatest part of your time in speaking of the Law of God.”

(4) “Every Sabbath Eve shall ye fast, and wash your whole body, and change your

garment.”‡

If possible the whole of this Operation should be performed in a place where

solitude can be obtained; the best being, as Abramelin writes: “Where there is a small

wood, in the midst of which you shall make a small Altar, and you shall cover the

same with a hut of fine branches, so that the rain may not fall thereon and extinguish

the Lamps and the Censer.Ӥ

 

The Altar should be made of wood and in the manner of a

cupboard, so that it may hold all the necessary things.

There should be two tunics, one of linen, and the other of

Crimson or Scarlet Silk with Gold.

 

The sacred oil is prepared from myrrh, cinnamon and

galangal mixed with olive oil. The incense of Olibanum,

storax, and lign aloes, or cedar, is reduced to a fine powder

and well mixed together. The Wand is cut from an Almondtree.

¶

* “The Book of the Sacred Magic,” pp. 69, 70. † Ibid. pp. 70, 71.

‡ Ibid. p. 71. § Ibid. p. 74. ¶ Ibid. pp 76, 77.

The third period having been completed, on the morning following: “Rise

betimes, neither wash yourself at all nor dress yourself at all in your ordinary clothes;

but take a Robe of Mourning; enter the Oratory with bare feet; go unto the side of

the Censer, and having opened the windows, return unto the door. There prostrate

yourself with your face against the ground, and order the Child (who is used as

assistant and clairvoyante) to put the Perfume upon the Censer, after which he is to

place himself upon his knees before the Altar; following in all things and throughout

the instructions which I have given unto you. . . . Humiliate yourself before God and

His Celestial Court, and commence your prayer with fervour, for then it is that you

will begin to enflame yourself in praying, and you will see appear an extraordinary

and supernatural Splendour which will fill the whole apartment, and will surround

you with an inexpressible odour, and this alone will console you and comfort your

heart so that you shall call for ever happy the Day of the Lord.*

* * * * * *

“During Seven Days shall you perform the Ceremonies without failing therein in

any way: namely, the Day of the Consecration, the Three Days of the Convocation of

the Good and Holy Spirits, and the Three other Days of the Convocation of the Evil

Spirits.

“On the second morning you shall follow the counsels your Holy Guardian Angel

shall have given you, and on the third you shall render thanks.

“And then shall you first be able to put to the test whether you shall have well

employed the period of your Six Moons, and how well and worthily you shall have

laboured in the quest of the Wisdom of the Lord; since you shall see your Guardian

Angel appear unto you in unequalled beauty: who also will converse with you, and

speak in words so full of affection and of goodness, and with such sweetness, that no

human tongue could express the same. . . . In one word, you shall be received by him

with such affection that this description I here give unto you shall appear a mere

nothing in comparison.Ӡ

 

After the Third day Abramelin very wisely writes:

 

“Now at this point I commence to restrict myself in my writing, seeing that by the

Grace of the Lord I have submitted and consigned you unto a MASTER so great that

he will never let you err.”‡

 

Thus, briefly though it be, we have run through the

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* “The Book of the Sacred Magic,” p. 81.

† Ibid. pp. 82, 85.

‡ Ibid. p. 85.

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system as advocated by one of the greatest masters of Magic

in the West. With perfect lucidity Abramelin brings us step by

step towards the MASTER—Augoeides, Adonai, Higher Self,

call Him what you will. By means of symbols of purity—by

cleanliness and clean living—he leads us on by meditation and

concentration through prayer to a one-pointedness, a vision or

conversation with the MASTER so full of goodness and

beauty, so full of rapture and ecstasy that no human tongue

can express the same. Alas! that we are not simple-minded

enough to accept it, and to seek at that little altar in the wood

that sweet reward which at once cancels all the toils and

sorrows of our lives.

 

But in these present times prayer has become a mockery,

and it is hard, how hard we know well, for any one to pray

with that earnestness which brings with it reward. The

rationalist has so befouled prayer with his wordy slush that it

is indeed a hard task to dissociate it from the host of external

symbols and images. A man who prays to a god is at once

imagined to be praying to a thing with legs; for the educated

are so surfeited with tangible things that the transcendental

entirely escapes them; yet the man who prays may in truth be

praying to the Master, and it matters not one whit whether the

Master have legs or no legs, for God does not depend on the

education of man's mind, or the standard of his knowledge, or

the idols he has set up. In some cases hostility to prayer

would prove more fruitful than devotion to it. He who

believes in denying and blaspheming God will attain to the

Divine Vision of Adonai as speedily as he who believes in

praying to Him and worshipping His Holy Name; so long as

he enflame himself with blasphemy and denial. It is the will

to accomplish, to conquer and overcome, which in both cases

carries with it the supreme reward, and not the mere fact of

denying or believing, which are but instruments towards this

end. But, be it well remembered! this mystery of the

Equivalence of all symbols, good and evil, is only true in

Daäth and from Daäth.

 

One man may fell a tree with an axe, another may saw it

down, another dig it up, another burn it down, another wash it

out of the earth by water, blast it by powder, or drag it down

by a rope. In the end the tree falls, and the desire of each

particular man is accomplished in spite of the variety of their

tools.

 

Thus we find that as Rising on the Planes was one

method, so was Skrying another; so again were the rituals of

the Golden Dawn; so again “The c of c Operation” and

Talismanic Magic; and now again still one more—the method

of Abramelin; all different means to enable man to fell the tall

tree of life and obtain the Master Vision of Adonai, the

Augoeides or Higher Self.

 

Each method, used rightly and carried to its ultimation,

leads to the same Heaven; each method used wrongly, or

mistaken for the End, side-tracks the Adept into some Limbo

or plunges him into some Hell.

 

To all such as are of a devout disposition Prayer offers an

excellent means of Concentration towards this end— identification

with Adonai. And it matters no whit to what we

pray, whether it be to Buddha or to Christ, or the top-hat

and gin-bottle of a West African ju-ju, so long as we pray

with our whole heart; and eventually, as the Vision informs,

belief, faith, prayer, worship and supplication vanish, the

burning-glass of our Will has set on fire the white sheet of

paper that had been our ideal; it crumples, turns brown,

blackens, and bursts into flame. The gates of the mind swing

apart, and the realm into which we rush is as different from

the realm which we had contemplated as our ideal as the

burning fire is to the cool white paper we had looked upon.

For those who cannot thus believe, who in fact have no faith

in prayer, there are yet other ways for them to travel, as we

shall presently see; in fact so many that each could travel by a

different road and yet arrive at the same destination; and it is

hoped that those who study this book may thereby discover

the speediest road to the Portal of the Temple.

 

Early in November, P. returned to London to consult

with Fratres I.A. and V.N., and shortly afterwards crossed

over to Paris, and after a few days' residence in that city

returned to England; and by means of the Codselim symbol

journeyed to D——, and from thence to T——. Here he

received a letter from I.A. warning him of very grave danger.

1. Thereupon invoked Heru-pa-kraatist and cast himself upon

the Providence of God: “that he may give His Angels charge

over me, to keep me in all my ways. So mote it be!”

Thus far the events which carry us down to the

commencement of the Operation, which begins with:

 

THE OATH OF THE BEGINNING.

 

I, P——, Frater Ordinis Rosae Rubeae et Aureae Crucis, a Lord of the Paths in

the Portal of the Vault of the Adepts, a 5°=6° of the Order of the Golden Dawn;

and an humble servant of the Christ of God; do this day spiritually bind myself

anew:

By the Sword of Vengeance:

By the Powers of the Elements:

By the Cross of Suffering:

That I will devote myself to the Great Work: the obtaining of Communion with

my own Higher and Divine Genius, (called the Guardian Angel) by means of the

prescribed course: and that I will use any Power so obtained unto the Redemption of

the Universe.

So help me the Lord of the Universe and mine own Higher Soul!

 

Let us now turn to “The Obligation of the Operation.”

 

I, P___, in the presence of the Lord of the Universe, and of all Powers Divine and

Angelic, do spiritually bind myself, even as I am now physically bound unto the

Cross of Suffering:

(1) To unite my consciousness with the divine, as I may be permitted and aided by

the Gods Who live for ever, the AEons of Infinite years, that, being lost in the

Limitless Light, it may find Itself: to the Regeneration of the Race, either of man or

as the Will of God shall be. And I submit myself utterly to the Will Divine.

(2) To follow out with courage, modesty, lovingkindness, and perseverance the

course prescribed by Abramelin the Mage; as far as in me lies, unto the attainment of

this end.

(3) To despise utterly the things and the opinions of this world lest they hinder me

in doing this.

(4) To use my powers only to the Spiritual well-being of all with whom I may be

brought in contact.

(5) To give no place to Evil: and to make eternal war against the Forces of Evil:

until even they be redeemed unto the Light.

(6) To harmonize my own spirit that so Equilibrium may lead me to the East and

that my Human Consciousness shall allow no usurpation of its rule by the Automatic.

(7) To conquer the temptations.

(8) To banish the illusions.

(9) To put my whole trust in the Only and Omnipotent Lord God: as it is written

“Blessed are they that put their trust in Him.”

(10) To uplift the Cross of Sacrifice and Suffering: and to cause my Light to shine

before men that they may glorify my Father which is in Heaven.*

Furthermore: I most solemnly promise and swear: to acquire this Holy Science in

the manner prescribed in the Book of Abramelin, without omitting the least imaginable

thing of their contents: not to gloss or comment in any way on that which may be or

may not be; not to use this Sacred Science to offend the Great God, nor to work ill unto

my neighbour: to communicate it to no living person, unless by long practice and

conversation I shall know him thoroughly, well examining whether such an one really

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* The reader will note that this is a sort of personal adaptation of the 5°=6° obligation.

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intendeth to work for the Good or for the Evil. I will punctually observe, in granting

it, the same fashion which was used by Abramelin to Abraham. Otherwise, let him

who receiveth it draw no fruit therefrom. I will keep myself as from a Scorpion from

selling this Science. Let this Science remain in me and in my generation as long as it

shall please the Most High.*

All these points I generally and severally swear to observe under the awful penalty

of the displeasure of God, and of Him to whose Knowledge and Conversation I do

most ardently aspire.

So help me the Lord of the Universe, and my own Higher Soul!

 

The obligation is followed, in the book, by various

preparations which we pass over in order that we may the

more speedily record some of the Visions which P.

experienced at this time: the first we quote is little better than

an obsession, and is as follows:

 

In bed, I invoked the Fire angels and spirits on the tablet, with names, etc., and

the 6th Key.† I then (as Harpocrates) entered my crystal. An angel, meeting me,

told me among other things, that they (of the tablets) were at war with the angels of the

30 Æthyrs, to prevent the squaring of the circle. I went with him unto the abodes of Fire,

but must have fallen asleep, or nearly so. Anyhow, I regained consciousness in a very

singular state half consciousness being there, and half here. I recovered and

banished the Spirits, but was burning all over, and tossed restlessly about—very sleepy,

but consumed of fire! Only repeated careful assumption of Harpocrates' god-form

enabled me to regain my normal state. I had a long dream of a woman eloping, whom

I helped, and after of a man stealing my Rose Cross jewel from a dressing-table in a

hotel. I caught him and found him a weak man beyond natural (I could bend or

flatten him at will), and then the dream seemed to lose coherence. . . . I carried him

about and found a hair-brush to beat him, &c. &c. Query: Was I totally obsessed?

 

The second is:

 

Invoking the angels of Earth I obtained a wonderful effect. The angel, my guide,

treated me with great contempt and was very rude and truthful. He shewed me divers

things. In the centre of the earth is formulated the Rose and Cross. Now the Rose is

the Absolute Self-Sacrifice, the merging of all in the 0 (Negative) the Universal

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* This latter portion of the obligation is taken from the Oath which Abramelin

imposed on his pupil Abraham.

† The Enochian Keys of Dr. Dee.

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Principle of generation through change (not merely the feminine), and the Universal

Light “Khabs.” The Cross is the Extension or Pekht principle. Now I should have

learned more but my attention wandered. This closes the four elemental visions:

prosecuted, alas! with what weakness, fatuity, and folly!

 

And, lastly, the following, which is of considerable interest:

 

I . . . in the afternoon shut myself up, and went on a journey. . . . I went with a

very personal guide: and beheld (after some lesser things) our Master as he sate by

the Well with the Woman of Samaria. Now the five husbands were five great

religions which had defiled the purity of the Virgin of the World: and “he whom thou

now hast” was materialism (or modern thought).

 

Other scenes also I saw in His life: and behold I also was crucified! Now did I go

backwards in time even unto Berashith, the Beginning, and was permitted to see

marvellous things.

 

First the Abyss of the Water: on which I, even I, brooded amid other dusky flames

as c upon m held by my Genius. And I beheld the victory of Râ upon Apophis and

the First of the Golden Dawns! Yea: and monsters, faces half-formed, arose: but they

subsisted not.

 

And the firmament was.

Again the Chaos and the Death!

 

Then Ath Hashamaim v. ath h-aretz. There is a whirling intertwining infinitude of

nebulae, many concentric systems, each system non-concentric to any other, yet all

concentric to the whole. As I went backwards in time they grew faster and faster, and

less and less material. (P.S.—This is the scientific hypothesis, directly contrary to

that of Anna Kingsford), and at last are whirling wheels of light: yet through them

waved a thrill of an intenser invisible light in a direction perpendicular to the tangents.

I asked to go yet further back and behold! I am floating on my back—cast down! in a

wind of Light flashing down upon me from the immeasurable Above. (This Light is

of a blueish silver tinge.) And I saw that Face, lost above me in the height inscrutable:

a face of absolute beauty. And I saw as it were a Lamb slain in the Glamour of Those

Eyes. Thus was I made pure: for there, what impunity could live? I was told that

not many had been so far back: none further: those who could go farther would not,

since that would have reabsorbed them into the Beginning, and that must not be to

him who hath sworn to uplift the Standard of Sacrifice and Sorrow, which is strength.

(I forgot the Angels in the Planetary Whirl. They regarded me with curiosity: and

were totally unable to comprehend my explanation that I was a Man, returning in

time to behold the Beginning of Things.)

 

Now was I able to stand in my Sephiroth: and the Crown of Twelve Stars was upon

my head! I then went into the centre of the earth (I suppose) and stood upon the top

of an high mountain. The many dragons and guardians I was able to overpower

by authority. Now the mount was of glistening whiteness, exceeding white as snow:

yet dead and unluminous. And I beheld a vision, even like unto that of the Universal

Mercury;* and I learnt that I myself was sulphur and unmercurial. Now having

attained the Mercurialising of my Sulphur I was able (in my vision) to fecundate the

mountain (of Salt). And it was instantly transmuted into gold. What came ye out into

the wilderness for to see? No: into living, glowing, molten Light: the Light that

redeemeth the material world! So I returned: having difficulty to find the earth(?).

But I called on S.R.M.D. and V.N.R. who were glad to see me; and returned into the

body: to waste the night in gibing at a foolish medico.

 

(It is worth noting here how very much more coherent this

Vision is than the first ones we have had occasion to mention.)

So far the second part of the “Book of the Operation.”

 

The third part of this book, which consists but of two

pages, begins obscurely enough:

 

“Heard this evening from D.D.† Second Order apparently

mad.”

 

However, this information which, from the following, we

gauge to be connected with the dead sea apple schism which

had for some time been ripening amongst the members of the

Order of the Golden Dawn, was considered sufficiently

important by P. for him to offer his services to G. H. Frater

D.D.C.F., who was then in Paris. About a week later P. writes:

“D.D.C.F. accepts my services, therefore do I rejoice, that my

sacrifice is accepted. Therefore do I again postpone the

Operation of Abramelin the Mage, having by God's Grace

formulated even in this a new link with the Higher, and

gained a new weapon against the Great Princes of the Evil of

the World. Amen.”

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* Described in a MS. edited by S.R.M.D. and issued to the Second Order, in

which is a picture of Mercury diving into the sea.

† Secretary of the Order of the Golden Dawn.

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Thus ends the “Book of the Operation.” But on the back

of the last page there is a note from which we gather the

following. That P. journeyed from London to Paris

(evidently shortly after his letter to D.D.C.F. he had left

T—— for London). There he was selected as the messenger

of D.D.C.F., after a long talk with him and V.N.R., and at

noon, four days later, he left Paris for London. This note ends

with the following words: “The history of my mission: is it not

written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Revolt of the

Adepti?”

 

Before glancing through this Chronicle of Revolt, which in

all truth might be called “The Book of the Fatuity of the

Inepti,” it will be necessary to return for a moment to that

interesting document, “The History Lection.”

 

The last point we arrived at in the Lection was that, “in

1900 one P., a brother, instituted a rigorous test of S.R.M.D. on

the one side and the Order on the other.” S.R.M.D. is but

another name for G.H. Frater D.D.C.F., against whose

authority the Second Order were now in open revolt. From

this point the Lection continues:

 

“He discovered that S.R.M.D., though a scholar of some

ability and a magician of remarkable powers, had never

attained complete initiation: and further had fallen from his

original place, he having imprudently attracted to himself

forces of evil too great and terrible for him to withstand.*

 

“The claim of the Order that the true adepts were in

charge of it was definitely disproved.

 

“In the Order, with two certain exceptions and two

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* Presumably Abramelin Demons.

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doubtful ones, he found no persons with any capacity for

initiation of any sort.

 

“He thereupon, by his subtle wisdom, destroyed both the

Order and its chief.

 

“Being himself no perfect adept, he was driven of the

Spirit into the Wilderness, where he abode for six years,

studying by the light of reason the sacred books and secret

systems of initiation of all countries and ages.”

 

We must now leave the Lection, to return to it again six

years later, and as briefly as possible run through the

Chronicles of Revolt, which consist of various documents for

the most part printed towards the close of 1900 and the

beginning of 1901, by such members of the Order as had

broken away from their chief, D.D.C.F. In a printed

document written on May 4, 1901, and signed by D.E.D.I., we

find the following:

 

You are aware that, originally, the Second Order in this country was governed

absolutely by three chiefs. Ultimately their authority all devolved on one—our late

chief, the G.H. Frater D.D.C.F., who was practically recognised as Autocrat.

 

This we have already learnt from the Lection. But from a

“Statement” issued to Adepti in February 1901, we further

learn that on April 1 (sic), 1897, V.H. Soror S.S.D.D. was

appointed head of the London branch of the Order and that

the formation of secret groups was advised and legalised by

D.D.C.F. “S.A. approved of this and formed a group himself,

as Silentio (sic) can bear witness.” However, in “Letters to

the Adepti of R.R. and A.C.” issued in the same month, it

appears that it was not by D.D.C.F.'s sanction, but through

their distrust of him, that Soror S.S.D.D. started a group in

London, and Frater S.S. one in Edinburgh. These groups

seemed to have worked as secret societies within the Order.

Fra: D.E.D.I. appears in this same document to have objected

to this, for we find him attempting to get S.S.D.D. to

amalgamate the smaller groups and form a larger group of

Theorici. This attempt led to a meeting of the Executive

Council in which S.S.D.D. raised an objection of D.E.D.I.'s

proposal; and we find D.E.D.I. writing: “I have sat on many

committees in my own country and elsewhere, but I am proud

to say that I never met among the mechanics, farmers and

shop-assistants with whom I have worked in Ireland a state of

feeling so ignoble, or resolutions so astonishing, as those I had

to listen to yesterday.”

 

From the "Statement" it appears that these groups were

the chief cause of the Revolt. D.D.C.F., permitting these

groups to be formed, little by little delegated his power to

others; so that when the crash came he had no magical force

left to meet it; and that those who had gained it had so

dispersed it among themselves that instead of causing them to

rise a phoenix out of the ashes of the past, it simply set them

squabbling and fighting over petty and absurd points of

morals and law. A fair specimen of the magical powers

displayed by the Order after the fall of D.D.C.F. is to be

found in the above “Statement.”

 

“. . . The most serious charge that Soror F.E.R. has brought against Soror S.S.D.D.

is that she has conducted the examinations unjustly.” S.S.D.D.'s reply was: “That

she has no time, even if she had the inclination, to indulge in futile acts of spite or

favouritism.”

 

Whilst revolt was simmering in the pot of dissatisfaction, it

appears that D.D.C.F. was residing in Paris, reviving the

mysteries of Isis at the Bodinière Theatre.* Here he and

________________________________________

* See the Sunday Chronicle, March 19, 1899.

________________________________________

 

his wife lived under a variety of pseudonyms such as “The

Hierophant Rameses,” and the “High Priestess Anari,” Count

and Countess MacGregor of Glenstrae, &c. &c. Their

success seems at first to have been considerable, for we read

in “The Humanitarian,” vol. xvi. No. 2, that their receptions

“are amongst the most interesting in Paris. You will find

people attending them of nearly every shade of opinion and

of profession: Isis-worshippers, Alchemists, Protestants,

Catholics, scientists, doctors, lawyers, painters, and men and

women of letters, besides persons of high rank.”

 

This success may have possibly distracted his attention

from the real state of affairs in England. However, from a

mere simmer the pot began to boil, and by the middle of

February 1900 the fat was fairly in the fire. It was also at about

this time, if not a few weeks earlier, that the notorious Madam

Horos introduced herself to D.D.C.F.; this question, however,

we will deal with a little later on, though in several ways it

seems to be connected with the present revolt. On February

16, 1900, from 87 Rue Mozart, D.D.C.F. addressed the

following letter to V.H. Soror S.S.D.D. (the Chief in charge in

Anglia). It is divided into five paragraphs, the last two of

which we give in full.

1. et V.H. Soror S.S.D.D.

 

                                                            * * * * * *

 

(d) Now, with regard to he Second Order, it would be with the very greatest regret

both from my personal regard for you, as well as from the occult standpoint, that I

should receive your Resignation as my Representative in the Second Order in London;

but I cannot let you form a combination to make a schism therein with the idea of

working secretly or avowedly under “Sapere Aude”* under the mistaken impression

________________________________________

* “S.A. was Sapere Aude (or Non Omnis Moriar), Dr. W. Wynn Westcott, King’s

Coroner for Hoxton.

________________________________________

 

that he received an Epitome of the Second Order work from G.H. Soror, “Sapiens

Dominabitur Astris.” For this forces me to tell you plainly (and, understand me well,

I can prove to the hilt every word which I here say and more, and were I confronted

with S.A., I should say the same), though for the sake of the Order, and for the

circumstance that it would mean so deadly a blow to S.A.’s reputation, I entreat you

to keep this secret from the Order, for the present, at least, though you are at perfect

liberty to show him this if you think fit, "after mature consideration.

 

(e) He has NEVER been at any time either in personal or in written communication

with the Secret Chiefs of the Order, he having either himself forged or procured to be

forged the professed correspondence between him and them, and my tongue having been

tied all these years by a previous Oath of Secrecy to him, demanded by him, from me,

before showing me what he had either done or caused to be done or both. You must

comprehend from what little I say here the extreme gravity of such a matter, and again

I ask you, both for his sake and that of the Order, not to force me to go further into

the subject.

 

This letter ends by stating that every atom of the

knowledge of the Order has been communicated to him, and

to him alone, by the Secret Chiefs of the Order, and that G.H.

Soror S.D.A. was now in Paris with him.*

 

It must be remembered here that in the “History Lection”

we learnt that S.R.M.D. (that is D.D.C.F.), by the death of

one of his colleagues and the weakness of the other, secured

sole authority over the Order; these two were G.H. Fratres

M.E.V. and N.O.M. (that is, S.A.); and it was the latter, so it

was generally supposed, who had first discovered the cipher

MSS. which led to the connecting-link being established with

G.H. Sopror S.D.A. and the great chiefs of the Third Order in

Germany.

 

S.S.D.D. on receiving the above letter went into the

country and spent whole days considering it, after which she

wrote to S.A., requesting an explanation of D.D.C.F.'s statement.

S.A. replied that he did not admit the accuracy of the

________________________________________

* This, as we shall shortly see, must have been Madame Horos

________________________________________

 

statement, though, his witnesses being dead, he could not legally

prove it false, and therefore he wished to remain neutral in the

matter. So for the first time he refused to sit upon a corpse.

 

On March 3, S.S.D.D. formed a Committee of Seven to

inquire into the matter. This Committee pointed out to

D.D.C.F. the seriousness of his accusation, and asked him to

give them proof of its accuracy. A considerable correspondence

ensued, in which D.D.C.F. absolutely and unconditionally

refused to acknowledge the Committee or to give

any proof whatsoever.

 

Consequent on this refusal, the Committee agreed to place

the matter before the Second Order.

 

On March 23, D.D.C.F. wrote a letter to S.S.D.D. purporting

to remove her from her position as his representative

in the Second Order.

 

On the 25th she replied: “I saw that if I kept silence I

should become a party to a fraud, and therefore took the

advice of some Members of the Order who have always been

friendly to your interests. . . .”

 

On March 24 a general meeting of the Second Order was

held, and D.D.C,F. was informed that the reason for making

his charge of forgery public was, that the whole constitution of

the Order depended upon the authenticity of the documents

that he alleged to be forged.

 

At a meeting of the Committee on March 29, L.O. stated

that he had seen S.A., who had given him his honourable

assurance that he had no reason to suppose that S.D.A. was

not the person she purported to be. He had only had

communication with her by letter, and had, bonâ fide, posted

letters to her in Germany in reply.

 

On April 2, D.D.C.F, wrote refusing to acknowledge the

right of the Second order to elect a Committee, and

threatened members with the Punitive Current.

 

At this juncture P., influenced, so far as himself knew, only

by the impulse of self-sacrifice for the Order that had done so

much for him; but, as is now apparent, secretly impelled by

the true and Unknown Chiefs of the Third Order to put both

the Order and its Chief to the test, crossed over to Paris and

offered his services to D.D.C.F. They were accepted, and he

was asked to act as envoy to the refractory brethren.

 

In his long talk with D.D.C.F., P. proposed that the

following scheme of action should be adopted to quell the

revolt of the Second Order:

 

1. The Second Order to be summoned at various times during two or three days.

They to find, on being admitted one by one, a masked man in authority and a scribe.

These questions, &c., pass, after pledge of secrecy concerning the interview.

(A) Are you convinced of the truth of the doctrines and knowledge received in

the grade of 5° = 6 °? Yes or No?

If yes (1) Then their origin can spring from a pure source only?

If no (2) I degrade you to be a Lord of the Paths in the Portal in the

Vault of the Adepts.

(B) If he reply “Yes,” the masked man continues: Are you satisfied with the logic

of this statement? Do you solemnly promise to cease these unseemly disputes

as to the headship of this Order? I for my part can assure you that from

my own knowledge D.D.C.F. is really a 7°= 4°.

If yes (3) Then you will sign this paper; it contains a solemn

reaffirmation of your obligation as a 5° = 6°) slightly expanded, and

a pledge to support heartily the new regulations.

If no (4) I expel you from this Order.

 

1. The practice of masks is to be introduced. Each member will know only the

member who introduced him.

Severe tests of the candidate's moral excellence, courage, earnestness, humility,

refusal to do wrong, to be inserted in the Portal or 5° = 6°) ritual.

 

III. Outer Order to be summoned. Similar regulations to be announced to them.

New pledges required that they will not communicate the identity of anybody they

happen to have known to any new member.

 

1. Vault to be reconsecrated.

 

D.D.C.F. at once accepted these proposals and gave to P.

the following instructions, which were at the time so hastily

jotted down in a note-book that they are now almost

impossible to decipher. From them we make out the

following:

 

That the false* Sapiens Dominabitur Astris was a very

stout woman and very fair, who possessed the power of

changing her appearance from youth to age and vice versâ.

That at present she has appeared as Mrs. Horos, or Howes, or

Dutton. Her husband, Theo Horos, whose mystical name is

Magus Sidera Regit, is a man of about twenty-five to thirty

years old, short and very fair. He does not look strong but is

extremely so. He has a bald patch on his head with very

yellow hair growing over it.

 

That Sapientia Ad Beneficiendum Hominibus† is very

dark and in appearance like S.S.D.D.

 

To accept nothing from these, and in case of doubt or

trouble to telegraph direct to him (D.D.C.F.).

 

Not to be taken in by mere tricks, and to be both

courteous and firm.

 

The warnings given to P. by D.D.C.F. were as follows:

 

If he were to feel feeble or ill or worried, and if fires

refused to burn, she (Madame Horos) may be expected.

________________________________________

* It will be evident that D.D.C.F. detected the fraud between the dates of his first

letter to S.S.D.D. and of P.’s arrival in Paris.

† Mrs. Rose Adams (?).

________________________________________

 

That the real H.P. Blavatsky and the real S.D.A. can

incarnate in her; and that they (her forces) have been against

D.D.C.F. for long.

 

That her occult name is Swami Vive Ananda.

 

That to work against them it was first necessary to separate

them, and, at the very last resort, arrest them for theft. (They

had stolen a travelling bag belonging to D.D.C.F., containing

his rituals.)

 

To wire their real address to D.D.C.F.

 

To use the MacGregor symbols—tartan and dirks. The

shoulder-plad to be thrown over the head to isolate (like

H.P.K. formula). And above all to use their own current

against them.

 

Symbol of Rose Cross only to be used to invoke D.D.C.F.

Other symbols were also given him.

 

1. had long learnt to pity the ignorance and folly of most of

the Members of the Order, as we learn from the “History

Lection”; he was now destined to put to the test the powers of

his alleged chief. If his appearance in England were followed

by immediate submission of the rebels, it might safely be

concluded that D.D.C.F. had not lost all control; if D.D.C.F.

failed, it was then P.'s intention occultly to confound and so

destroy the Order.

 

1. at once set out on his return journey to England, and

throughout followed in the minutest details the instructions

given him by D.D.C.F. On arriving in London he immediately

set his powers in motion. He was at once rejected by

various members of the Order, who had always been bitterly

envious of his powers and progress.

 

On the first day of his arrival in London he went to see

Soror P.E.C.Q. and Frater S.: on his way the cab-lamps

catch fire, and later a cab-horse runs away with him,

and Soror S.S.D.F.'s fire refuses to burn. This was on a

Friday.

 

On Saturday the rose cross given him by D.D.C.F. began

to lose colour and whitened; a rubber mackintosh nowhere near

the fire suddenly caught light; and fires were by no means

anxious to burn. Again he went to see Soror P.E.C.Q., and in

the evening records a long dream about “the Horos lot.”

“They were at C——,” he writes, “and wanted to get a

particular MS. I had no one I could trust at all, and it was hell

and Tommy for a long while. But it ended tragically enough

for them.”

 

On Sunday he saw various members of the Order; and on

Monday saw Soror S.S.D.F., arranged with her final details,

and captured the Vault. He writes: In the morning early I was

very badly obsessed, and entirely lost my temper—utterly

without reason or justification. Five times at least have horses

bolted at sight of me.” Also: “Fires at 15 R.R. refuse utterly

to burn.”

 

On Tuesday he recaptured vault and suspended H.S. and

it appears S.S.D.D., who sought aid from the police, and, so to

speak, with the majority of the fallen Order under the

protection of the truncheons of Scotland Yard, drew up a new

set of rules and regulations, and expelled such members from

the Order as had shown any knowledge superior to their own.

 

Thus it came to pass that on April 21, 1900, the Second

Order of the Golden Dawn struggled through the fogs of their

own fatuity; the sun of Occult Knowledge rising in the Outer

Court of Scotland Yard to illumine twenty-two members of

the R.R. and A.C. and the few remaining sleepy constables

that the lightning flash had not destroyed.

 

Five days later we find D.D.C.F. writing to one of the

brothers of the Order as follows:

 

. . . I admit that I have committed one great though unavoidable fault, which is

this: in giving these persons so great a knowledge I have not also been able to give

them brains and intelligence to comprehend it, for this miracle the Gods have not

granted me the power to perform. You had better address your reproaches to the

Gods rather than to me, unless some spark of returning wisdom can make you

recognise in such “critics” the swine who trample the Divine teaching under foot.

 

With all this we entirely agree, and so eventually did P.;

but D.D.C.F. had also failed, the bow had proved as rotten as

the arrows, and now P., throwing the empty quiver of the

Golden Dawn aside, set out alone on the next stage of his

Mystic Progress. P. was not yet certain of this failure of

D.D.C.F. The final test was made two years later, and is

described in due course.

 

As to the intrigues of Madame Horos and her husband,

nothing very definite is known. But on October 23, 1901,

when the Horos case was before the public gaze, D.D.C.F.

addressed a letter from Paris to the Editor of Light* in which

he states that on October 13 he wrote a letter to Mr. Curtis

Bennett “to protest against the shameful and utterly

unauthorised use of its name (the Order of the Golden

Dawn) for their own abominable and immoral purposes

by the execrable couple calling themselves ‘Mr. and Mrs.

Horos.’ ”

________________________________________

* This letter was not published in Light until January 11, 1901, as at the time the

case was sub judice.

________________________________________

 

Further, D.D.C.F.* writes:

 

Coincident with certain dissensions in my Order, stirred up by a few members,

constant fermentors of discord, jealous of my authority, though clamorous for my

teaching, the so-called Mr. and Mrs. Horos and a Mrs. Rose Adams, who said she was

a doctor of medicine, came to me in Paris in the beginning of last year (1900) with an

introduction from an acquaintance of good social standing. At this time my name was

well known here in connection with lectures on Ancient Egyptian Religious

Ceremonies. The female prisoner stated that they had come with the intention of

aiding me in this, and she professed to be an influential member of the Theosophical

society, and also of my own Order, giving me the secret name† of a person of high

occult rank in it, who had been reported to be dead some years before. I have yet to

learn how, when, where and from whom she obtained the knowledge of that Order,

which she then certainly possessed. She was also acquainted with the names and

addresses of several of the members, notably of those belonging to the discordant

category. . . .

 

D.D.C.F. then states that she stole from his house several

MSS. relating to the Order of the G\ D\:

 

“From these she and her infamous accomplices would seem

to have concocted some form of initiation under the name of my

Order, to impose upon their unfortunate victims.” Coincident

with her second appearance more dissension arose in the Order,

“culminating in severance of the discordant members from it.”

 

As far as it goes this seems to be an honest and straightforward

account.‡ But D.D.C.F. does not state, as he must

have known at the time, that Madame Horos was a Vampire

of remarkable power, that is to say, one who, following the

left-hand path, uses sexual love as a bait to catch her victims

by, and that she had told him (as he, D.D.C.F., told P. at the

time he appointed P. his envoy) that she (Soror S.V.A.)

________________________________________

* In this letter D.D.C.F. signs himself G. S. L. MacGregor Mathers (Comte

MecGregor de Glenstrae).

† S.D.A.

‡ In this letter Mr. Mathers points out the perfectly pure intentions of the Order;

who could have doubted it after Inspector Kane’s pronouncement at the trial of

Madame Horos: “It is a perfectly pure Order”?

________________________________________

 

could be “overshadowed by H.P. Blavatsky and G.H.

Soror S.D.A. 8°=3°.” This D.D.C.F. said he knew, because

she had related to him details of a very private conversation

he had had with Madame Blavatsky at Denmark Hill; also

that he most certainly knew that she must be at least a 6°=5°

on account of her power of performing miracles.*

 

As D.D.C.F. apparently much dreaded that Madame

Horos might take over the command of the Order in London,

he, as we have seen, instructed P. to use cold steel and the

MacGregor Tartan against her.† He also informed P. that she

had stolen some rituals in a portmanteau, which theft, it will

be remembered, P. was to make use of as a last weapon

against her. He further added that she was a “financial

fraud,” and that her husband was but a victim to her

vampirism, a sort of soulless maniac, possessing unexpected

and demoniacal strength when inspired by her. Her motive,

he thought, was hostility against the Order and himself, and as

________________________________________

* One or two curious points in her trial are worth recording. Laura Horos, alias The

Swami, alias Mrs. Jackson, alias Soror S.V.A., claimed to be Princess Editha Lollito

Baroness Rosenthal, Countess of Landfeld, daughter of Louis I., King of Bavaria, and

Lola Montez (for Lola Montez see “Lola Montez: an Adventuress of the Forties,” by

Edmund B. D’Auvergne). In Cape Town she had promoted “The Order of

Theocratic Unity,” which was also called “The Order of the Atonement,” and the

“United Templars.” Her whole trial was marked by the disgusting display of public

eagerness to revel in the filth that was disclosed. At the time, from the coroneted

aristocrat to the red-tied demagogue, all classes in England were smacking their filthy

lips over such insinuating muck as: “Daisy is a dark little thing, bright and attractive,

with hair down her back in thick curls, and looking even less that her age” (sixteen).—

The Sun, October 17, 1901. On leaving the court the day before this tasty paragraph

appeared in the above-mentioned feculent luminary, the public having for several

hours greedily sniffed round her messes, commenced to hiss at her, whereupon she

turned upon them and shouted: “Shut up, you reptiles. It's only snakes that hiss.”

For this remark alone her final sentence should most certainly have been reduced.

† Because she had been afraid of them.

________________________________________

 

he expressed it: “to the current sent at the end of a century to

regenerate this planet.”

 

N.’s statement again varies somewhat from the above, and

is probably more trustworthy. It is as follows:

 

S.V.A.* came suddenly to Paris and informed D.D.C.F.

that she was S.D.A. 8°=3°, who had not died as had been

reported. On hearing this D.D.C.F. at once accepted her

statement.† She promised him a large sum of money to build

a temple to Isis;‡ for at this time D.D.C.F. was starting what

he called “The Mysteries of Isis,” and the public dances and

entertainments were being held by V.N.R.§ at the Bodinière

Theatre.

 

Now that she had turned out to be a fraud it proved that

D.D.C.F. was a fraud also.¶

 

This of course is as ridiculous as assertion to make as that

made by another member of the Order, which was:

 

“That if indeed it were the promise of S.V.A.’s money that

had satisfied D.D.C.F.’s conscience, then he most certainly

must be a fraud.”

 

P., in his own subtle way, saw this, arguing that in the

case where a great man claims to be a leader amongst men, it

is permissible to suppose that his actions may be meant to

place his followers between the horns of a rational dilemma.

________________________________________

* Fra: Æ.A. of the G\ D\ believes that some American members of the Order

met Madame Horos in New York, and from them it was that she obtained her

knowledge.

† Probably after S.V.A. had given him the grade signs.

‡ This explains the term “financial fraud.”

• D.D.C.F.’s “hermetic” wife: for a more correct account see “The Humanitarian,”

vol. xvi. No. 2, “Isis-Worship in Paris.”

¶ From this wonderful piece of logic one might be permitted to mistake N. for a

member of the Rationalistic Press Association. But he was only a 5°=6°.

________________________________________

 

The disciple who can recognize Christ in the darkness that

surrounds the Cross, he is a true disciple. P. suspended

judgment on D.D.C.F. till he had proved that he had pledged

his honour, to excuse a maniacal assault upon a Saint of God,

Frater I.A.

 

It is permissible for a great musician to improvise in some

great masterpiece he may be playing; but it is not permissible

for a student to say that he can play this piece when he can

only scrape through it by improvising easy bars for the more

difficult ones. Similarly with a great Magician; he can indulge

in petty black magical tricks if he so desire (there is always a

danger), for at a breath they will vanish before the greater

magic that is his. But the shivering little cardshuffler who

pretends he is the Master because he has successfully forced a

card on a village curate, not only cuts off all hope of ever

becoming such, but unless he is extremely careful, will find

himself literally in the place of the evil triad, marching, not

between Isis and Nephthys, but between two sturdy

guardians of the peace.

 

Towards the end of April, 1900, P. returned to his lonely

house in the north, but only remaining there a few days, he

travelled back to Paris. For it was now past Easter, and so too

late in the year to begin the Operation of Abramelin.

 

He had, as we have seen induced D.D.C.F. to put in

force the Deadly and Hostile Current of Will, but, as in the

case of the Jackdaw of Rheims, nobody seemed a penny the

worse. One might have expected that D.D.C.F. having failed,

1. would have abandoned him. No, for it seemed still

possible that D.D.C.F., really in touch with the Supreme

Chiefs, had yet finally decided to say with Christ upon the

Cross: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they

do,” even though this theory was somewhat rudely shaken by

D.D.C.F spending the whole of one Sunday afternoon in

rattling a lot of dried peas in a sieve under the impression that

they were the revolted members: as subsequent events

proved, they were only the ideas in his head. So we find P.

still loyal, if a little sceptical, and searching within himself to

discover a touchstone by which he might prove beyond doubt

the authenticity of D.D.C.F.'s claim to represent the Masters.

Now, there had been a good deal of talk of an adventure that

happened to D.D.C.F. and Frater I.A., who was a guest in his

house, in which a revolver figured prominently; but the story

was only vague, and Frater I.A., who could and would have

told the truth about it, had departed for a distant colony. So

on arriving in Paris, P. lured D.D.C.F. into telling the story,

which was as follows: That he and I.A. had disagreed upon an

obscure point in theology, thereby formulating the accursed

Dyad, thereby enabling the Abramelin demons to assume

material form: one in his own shape, another in that of I.A.

Now, the demon that looked like I.A. had a revolver, and

threatened to shoot him (D.D.C.F.), while the demon that

resembled himself was equally anxious to shoot I.A. Fortunately,

before the demons could fire, V.N.R. came into the

room, thus formulating the symbol of the Blessed Trinity, of

which her great purity of character would naturally fit her to

be a prominent member. Now, the only probability about

this story, which D.D.C.F. related on his magical honour as

a 7°=4°, was that D.D.C.F. saw double. Frater P., however,

was not going to judge any isolated story by the general

laws of probability, so, bowing gracefully, he rose and set out

to find Frater I.A., whom he eventually ran down at the house

of a holy Yogi in the Cinnamon Gardens, Colombo, to hear his

account.

 

Frater I.A.'s account was less of a strain upon P.'s faculties

of belief. They had had, he said, an argument about the God

Shiva, the Destroyer, whom I.A. worshipped because, if one

repeated his name often enough, Shiva would one day open

his eye and destroy the Universe, and whom D.D.C.F. feared

and hated because He would one day open His eye and

destroy D.D.C.F. I.A. closed the argument by assuming the

position Padmasana and repeating the Mantra: “Shiva, Shiva,

Shiva, Shiva, Shiva, Shiva.” D.D.C.F., angrier than ever,

sought the sideboard, but soon returned, only to find Frater

I.A. still muttering: “Shiva, Shiva, Shiva, Shiva, Shiva.” “Will

you stop blaspheming?” cried D.D.C.F.; but the holy man

only said: “Shiva, Shiva, Shiva, Shiva, Shiva, Shiva, Shiva,

Shiva, Shiva, Shiva.” “If you don't stop I will shoot you!" said

D.D.C.F., drawing a revolver from his pocket, and levelling it

at I.A.'s head; but I.A., being concentrated, took no notice,

and continued to mutter: “Shiva, Shiva, Shiva, Shiva, Shiva,

Shiva.”

 

Whether overawed by the majesty of the saint, or

interrupted by the entry of a third person, I.A. no longer

remembered, but D.D.C.F. never pulled the trigger. It was

only after this interview, which did not take place till August

1901, that P. definitely decided against D.D.C.F. We must

now return to his wanderings, and so we find him in July 1900

crossing the Atlantic to New York.

 

From New York P. journeyed to Mexico: in this country he

travelled about alone for three months; and whilst in

Mexico D.F. became partaker in a wonderful experience

known as “the Vision and the Voice.”*67 Shortly after this

vision, he founded at Guanajato the Order of the L.I.L., and

the fire of Adonai descending upon him, he wrote “The Book

of the Spirit of the Living God,” of which the two following

rituals are part:

 

THE BOOK OF THE SPIRIT OF THE LIVING GOD.

rps

jwrh

yjlah

The Casting-out of the Evil ones.

The Consecration of the Shrine.

The Cleansing of the Son of Man.

The Drawing together of the Elements.

The Coming of the Golden Dawn.

The Indwelling of the Isis.

The Initiation of the Whirling Force.

The Chant of Mystery.

The Music of the Divine One.

The Movement of the Spirit.

The Descent of the Soul of Isis.

The Night of Apophis.

The Light of Osiris.

The Knowledge of the Higher Soul.

These be duly written; these shall be, unto the Glory of Thine Ineffable Name.

 

[The Aspirant, having fasted for a period of nine days, during which he constantly

aspireth unto the Higher, shall now enter the Temple which he hath prepared

(banishing and consecrating with Fire and Water) and its order and disposition is

thus: Let there be a square altar and pillars as for the Neophyte ceremony. On the

altar is the Symbol of Isis, with the elements as usual. And know thou that the altar

may be removed unto the East after the Great Invocation of Isis, where he shall duly

confess himself in the Presence of God the Vast One. Whereafter, let him arise, and,

standing in the Sign of Osiris Slain, let him obligate himself as followeth and is

hereafter duly set down in clear writing.]

________________________________________

* Two of the “Cries of the Æthyrs.”

________________________________________

 

THE OBLIGATION

[To be most solemnly accepted by him who would attain unto the knowledge and

conversation of his Holy Genius.]

 

In my bondage and affliction, O Lord, let me raise Thy Holy Symbol alike of

Suffering and of Strength. I invoke Thee, the great avenging angel HUA, to place

thine hand invisibly upon mine head, in attestation of this mine Obligation!

 

I, . . . a member of the body of Aeshoori, do spiritually bind myself, even as I am

this day physically bound unto the Cross of Suffering.

 

That I will to the utmost endeavour lead a pure and an unselfish life: not revealing

to any other person the mysteries which shall herein be revealed unto me: that I will

obey the dictates of my Higher Soul: that I will work in silence and with

perseverance against all opposition: I furthermore most solemnly promise and swear

that with the Divine Permission I will from this day apply myself constantly unto the

Great Work: that is, so to purify and exalt my spiritual nature, that with the Aid

Divine, I may at length attain to be more than human; and that in this event I will

not abuse the great power entrusted unto me. I will invoke the Great Names of God

the Vast One before performing any important magical working. I will yearn

constantly in love toward the whole of mankind. I will work constantly to the Great

End, on pain of being degraded from my present state. Finally, if there arise in me

any thought or suggestion seeming to emanate from the Divine, I will examine it

with care before acknowledging it to be so.

 

Such are the Words of this my Obligation, whereto I pledge myself in the

Presence of the Divine One and of the Great Avenging Angel HUA.

 

And if I fail herein, may my rose be disintegrated and my power in magic cease!

 

[Let the Stigmata be placed upon the Aspirant.

 

Then let the Aspirant retire; and being invested with the White Robe, the Blue

Sash and the Crown and nemys of our Art let him re-enter the Temple and perform the

supreme ritual of the Pentagram* in the four quarters; Having first purified the Temple

with Fire and Water, and further equilibrated the symbols in his Magical Mirror of

the Universe by the Invocation hereafter set down (Come unto me, O Ma, &c.) with

the Calls or Keys Enochian suitable thereunto.

 

And in all this is the wand held by the path of t: for why? because in drawing

down the light Divine; so is it manifest in the Sphere immediately above Malkuth:

and in banishing is the Flaming Sword set against the enemies; and in t is the

knowledge of the Elements and the Astral Plane; also t = the Cross.

________________________________________

* See “Liber O,” THE EQUINOX, vol. i. No. 2.

________________________________________

 

Let him then perform the invoking Ritual of the Supernals:* by the names

hyha : hy : \yhla hwhy and atyrara.

 

And after this let him turn again to the East and recite the Great Invocation of

IAW beginning:

 

“Thee I invoke the Bornless One.”†

 

And this being accomplished, let him lift up his heart unto that Light, and dwell therein,

and aspire even unto that which is beyond. And seeing that the gate is called Strait, let

him invoke Her who abideth therein, in the path called Daleth, even Our Lady ISIS.]

 

THE INVOCATION OF ISIS.

 

And I beheld a great wonder in Heaven: a Woman clothed with the Sun: and the

Moon was at Her feet: and on Her Head was the Diadem of the Twelve Stars.

Hear me, Our Lady Isis, hear and save.

O Thou, Queen of Love and Mercy!

Thou, crowned with the Throne!

Thou, hornèd as the Moon! Thou, whose countenance is mild and glowing, even

as grass refreshed by rain!

Hear me, Our Lady Isis, hear and save!

O Thou, who art in Mater manifest!

Thou Bride and Queen as Thou art Mother and Daughter of the Crucified!

O Thou, who art the Lady of the Earth!

Hear me, Our Lady Isis, hear and save!

O Thou, Our Lady of the Amber Skin!

Lady of Love and Victory!

Bright gate of Glory through the darkling skies!

O crowned with Light and Life and Love!

Head me, Our Lady Isis, hear and save!

By Thy Sacred Flower, the Lotus of Eternal Life and Beauty;

By Thy love and mercy;

By Thy wrath and vengeance;

By my desire toward Thee;

In the name of Aeshoori;

Hear me, Our Lady Isis, hear and save!

Open thy bosom to Thy child!

Stretch wide thy arms and strain me to Thy Breast!

Let my lips touch Thy lips ineffable!

Hear me, Our Lady Isis, hear and save!

________________________________________

* See “Liber O,” THE EQUINOX, vol. i. No. 2.

† See The Lesser Key of Solomon: The Goetia.

________________________________________

 

Lift up Thy Voice and aid me in this hour!

Lift up Thy Voice most musical!

Cry aloud, O Queen and Mother!

Lift up your heads, O ye Gates,

And be ye lift up, ye everlasting Doors.

And the King of Glory shall come in!

Hear me, Our Lady Isis, and receive!

By the symbol of Thy whirling force the Svastika of Flaming Light,

I invoke Thee to initiate my soul!

Let the whirling of my magic dance be a spell and a link with Thy great Light: so

that in the Hour of Apophis, in the apparent darkness and corruption of unconsciousness,

may rise the golden Sun of Aeshoori, reborn from incorruption.

Hear, Lady Isis, and receive my prayer!

Thee, Thee I worship and invoke!

Hail, Hail to thee, Sole Mother of my Life!

Dwell Thou in me, and bring me to that Self which is in Thee!

 

[The Altar is now moved, if necessary, and the chant and the mystic dance take

place, as is set down hereafter.]

 

THE CHANT.

 

Hear, O Amoun! Look with favour on me, Thy Neophyte, now kneeling in Thy

presence! Grant that the Music of Thy Mighty Name IAW, the signs of Light, the

Symbol of the Cross, the woven paces of the mystic 3, may be as a spell and a charm

and a working of Magic Art, to draw down my Higher Soul to dwell within my heart,

that the Great and Terrible Angel who is my Higher Genius may abide in my own

Kether unto the Accomplishing of the Great Work and the Glory of Thine Ineffable

Name, AMOUN.

 

THE MYSTIC DANCE.

 

[Here we have the sign of the Cross at the Centre. The Magus then whirls off in

the triple 3, chanting the Name and giving the sign appropriate, very slowly at first,

ever quickening. And having fallen down in an ecstasy, let him after awake; and say:

“I am the Resurrection and the Life,” &c., down to the Key Word.*

 

Which being done, let the Lesser Banishing Rituals of Pentagram and Hexagram†

be performed, the Lights extinguished, and the Temple left in Silence.]

 

THE GREAT OPERATION OF INVISIBILITY.

 

The Begetting of the Silence.

The Dwelling of the Darkness.

________________________________________

* See 5°=6° Ritual, supra. † See “Liber O,” THE EQUINOX, vol. i. No. 2.

________________________________________

 

The Formulation of the Shroud.

The Inmost Light.

The Sign of Defence and Protection.

The Closing of the Mouths of the Crocodiles.

The Fear upon the Dwellers of Water.

The Radiant Youth of the Lord.

The Rising from the Lotus of the Floods.

The Habitation of the Palace of Safety.

The Understanding of the Peace of God.*

 

All this is the Knowledge of HOOR-PO-KRAT-IST unto Whom be the Glory for

ever and ever, World without End.

 

[The Usual Banishings, Consecrations, &c., are performed in temple of 0°=0°.

 

The forces of Spirit are first invoked by the Supreme Ritual of the Pentagram and

the Enochian Keys. Add Hexagram ritual of Binah and her invocation.]

 

Come unto Me, Thoth, Lord of the Astral Light! I adjure Thee, O Light

Invisible, Intangible, wherein all thoughts and deeds are written; I adjure Thee by

Thoth, thy Lord and God; by the symbols and the words of power: by the Light of

my Godhead in Thy midst: by the Lord Harpocrates, the God of this mine Operation:

that Thou leave Thine abodes and habitations, to concentrate about me, invisible,

intangible, as a shroud of darkness; a formula of defence: that I may become invisible,

so that seeing me men see not, nor understand the thing that they behold!

 

Come unto me, O Ma, Goddess of Truth and Justice! Thou that presidest over

the Eternal Balance.

Auramooth, come unto me, Lady of the Water!

Thoum-aesh-neith, come unto me, Lady of the Fire!

Purify me and consecrate, for I am Aeshoori the Justified. For the Twelve Stars of

Light are on my Brow: Wisdom and Understanding are balanced in my thought!

Wrath in my right hand and the Thunderbolts;

Mercy in my left hand and the fountains of delight!

In my heart is Aeshoori and the Symbol of Beauty.

My thighs are as pillars on the right and on the left; Splendour and Victory, for

they cross with the currents reflected. I am established as a Rock, for Jesod is my

foundation.

________________________________________

* Note that the whole Operation may be performed mentally and in silence, and

that on each occasion of concentrating the shroud the God-form and Vibration of

Harpocrates, as taught, may be employed.

________________________________________

 

And the sphere of the Nephesch, and the palaces of Malkuth are cleansed and

consecrate, balanced and beautiful, in the might of Thy Name, Adonai, to whom be

the Kingdom, the Sceptre and the Splendour: The Rose of Sharon and the Lily of the

Valley.

 

O Thou! HOOR-PO-KRAT-IST! [Middle Pillar.]

Child of the Silence!

O Thou! HOOR-PO-KRAT-IST! [Mystic Circumambulation.]

Lord of the Lotus!

O Thou! HOOR-PO-KRAT-IST! [Silence.]

Thou that standest on the heads of the dwellers of the Waters!

Thee, Thee I invoke!

O Thou, Babe in the Egg of Blue!

Lord of Defence and Protection!

Thou who bearest the Rose and Cross of Life and Light!

Thee I invoke!

Behold I am! a circle on whose hands the Twelvefold Kingdom of my Godhead stands.

I am the A and the W.

My life is as the circle of the sky.

I change but I cannot die!

O ye! the Bennu Birds of Resurrection, Who are the hope of men's mortality!

Back, Crocodile Mako, Son of Set! Depart from me, ye workers of iniquity!

 

Behold He is in Me and I in Him!

Mine is the Lotus, as I rose from the firmament of Waters;

My throne is set on high;

My light is in the firmament of Nu!

I am the Centre and the Shrine: I am the Silence and the Eternal Light:

Beneath my feet they rage, the angry crocodiles; the dragons of death; the eaters of

the wicked.

But I repress their wrath: for I am HOOR-PO-KRAT-IST, the lotus-throned Lord

of Silence.

If I said: Come up upon the mountains, the celestial waters would flow at my word

and the celestial fires flame forth. For I am Râ enshrouded: Khephra unmanifest to

men; I am my father Hoor, the might of the Avenger: and my mother Asi, the Veiled

One: Eternal wisdom in eternal beauty.

Therefore I say unto Thee: Bring Me unto Thine Abode in the Silence

Unutterable, Wisdom: All-Light, All Power!

HOOR-PO-KRAT-IST! Thou Nameless Child of the Eternities! Bring me to

Thee, that I may be defended in this work of Art.

Thou, the Centre and the Silence!

Light Shrouded in Darkness is Thy Name!

The Celestial Fire is Thy Father!

Thy Mother the Celestial Sea!

 

Thou art the Equilibrium of the All, and Thou art Lord against the Face of the

Dwellers within the Waters!

 

Bring me, I say, bring me to Thine abode of Silence: that I may go invisible: so

that every Spirit created, and every soul of man and beast; and every thing of sight

and sense, and every Spell and Scourge of God, may see me not nor understand!

And now, in the Name of God the Vast One, Who hath set limits and bounds unto

all material and astral things, do I formulate a barrier and a bar without mine astral

form, that it may be unto me as a wall, and as a fortress, and as a defence.

And I now declare that it is so formulated, to be a basis and receptacle for the

Shroud of Darkness which I shall presently encincture me withal.

And unto ye, O forces of Akasa,* do I now address my Will.

In the Great Names Exarp, Hcoma, Nanta and Bitom,†

By the mysterious letters and sigils of the Great Tablet of Union.‡

By the mighty Names of God AHIH, AGLA, IHVH, ALHIM.

By the Great God Harpocrates;

By your deep purple darkness;

By my white and brilliant light do I conjure ye:

Collect yourselves together about me: clothe this astral form with a shroud of

darkness:

Gather, O Gather, Flakes of Astral Light:

Shroud, shroud my form in your substantial night:

Clothe me and hide me, at my charm’s control;

Darken man’s eyes and blind him in his soul!

Gather, O Gather, at my Word Divine,

Ye are the Watchers and my soul the shrine!

 

[Let formulate the Idea of becoming Invisible; imagine the results of success:

 

Then say:]

 

Let the shroud of concealment encircle me at a distance of ten inches from the

physical body.

Let the Sphere be consecrated with Water and with Fire. [Done.]

O Auramooth and O Thoum-aesh-neith, I invoke and beseech you: Let the vapour

________________________________________

* The Element of Spirit.

† The names on the Tablet of Spirit.

‡ The Tablet of Spirit.

________________________________________

 

of this water, and of this fire, be as a basis on the material plane for the formation of

this shroud of Art.

 

[Form mentally the shroud.]

 

I, P., Frater of the Order of the Golden Dawn, and a 5°=6° thereof: a Lord of the

Paths in the Portal of the Vault of the Adepts: a Frater Ordinis Rosae Rubeae et

Aureae Crucis: and especially a member of the 0°= 0° grade: master of the pass-word

“H——” and of the Grand Word “M——,” am here: in order to formulate to myself a

shroud of concealment: that I may attain unto knowledge and power, to use in the

Service of the Eternal Gods: that I may pursue safely and without interruption my

magical and other pursuits: and that I may pass unseen among men, to execute the

Fiat of Tetragrammaton. And I bind and obligate myself and do spiritually swear and

affirm: that I will use this power to a good purpose only, and in the service of the

Gods.

 

And I declare that in this Operation I shall succeed: that the Shroud shall conceal

me alike from men and spirits; that it shall be under my control: ready to disperse and

to re-form at my command.

 

And I declare that all is now ready for the due fulfilment and prosecution of this

mine Operation of Magick Art.

 

[Go to Altar as Hierophant, left hand on triangle, right hand holding Verendum, by

path of t or Malkuth.]

 

THE POTENT EXORCISM.

 

Come unto me, O shroud of darkness and of night. I conjure ye, O particles of

Darkness, that ye enfold me, as a guard and shroud of utter Silence and of Mystery.

 

In the name AHIH and by the name AHIH!

In the name AGLA and by the name AGLA!

In the name EXARP and by the name EXARP!

In the name HCOMA and by the name HCOMA!

In the name NANTA and by the name NANTA!

In the name BITOM and by the name BITOM!

In the name TETRAGRAMMATON ELOHIM and by the name TETRAGRAMMATON

ELOHIM!

In the name HOOR-PO-KRAT-IST and by the name HOOR-PO-KRAT-IST!

By your deep purple darkness!

By my white brilliant light!

 

I invoke ye: I conjure ye: I exorcise ye potently: I command and constrain ye: I compel

ye to utter, absolute and instant obedience, and that without deception or delay,—for

why? The Light of Godhead is my trust and I have made IHVH mine hope!

 

“Gather, O Gather, Flakes of Astral Light:

Shroud, shroud my form in your substantial night:

Clothe me and hide me, at my charm's control;

Darken man's eyes and bind him in his soul!

Gather, O Gather, at my Word Divine,

Ye are the Watchers and my soul the shrine!”

 

[Turn round three times.]

 

In the Name of the Lord of the Universe and by the Power of mine own Higher

Soul and by the Aspiration of Thine Higher Soul I conjure thee, O shroud of

darkness and of mystery, that thou encirclest me, so that I may become invisible: so

that seeing me men may see not, neither understand: but that they may see the thing

that they see not and comprehend not the thing that they behold! So mote it be!

[Go North.]

 

I have set my feet in the North and have said: “I will shroud myself in mystery

and concealment.”

 

The Voice of My Higher Soul said unto me:

“Let me enter the path of darkness: peradventure thus may I attain the Light. I

am the Only Being in an Abyss of Darkness: from the Darkness came I forth ere my

birth; from the Silence of a Primal Sleep.” And the Voice of Ages answered unto my

soul:

 

“I am He that formulates in Darkness: the Light indeed shineth in Darkness, but

the Darkness comprehendeth it not.”

 

Let the Mystic Circumambulation take place in the Place of Darkness.

 

[Go round, knocks, &c. In South formulate Pillars as before and imagine self as shrouded.]

 

[In the West.]

 

Invisible, I cannot pass by the Gate of the Invisible save by virtue of the Name of Darkness.

 

[Formulate forcibly shroud about thee.]

 

Darkness is My Name and Concealment!

I am the Great One Invisible of the Paths of the Shades. I am without fear though

veiled in Darkness: for within me, though unseen, is the Magic of the Light!

 

[Go round. In North, Pillars, &c., as before.]

 

[In the East.]

 

Invisible, I cannot pass by the Gate of the Invisible, save by virtue of the Name of Light.

 

[Form shroud forcibly.]

 

I am Light shrouded in Darkness. I am the wielder of the Forces of the Bilanx!

 

[Concentrate shroud mentally. Go West of Altar.]

 

[The Potent Exorcism as before.]

 

Shroud of Concealment, long has thou dwelt concealed! Quit the Light, that thou

mayst conceal me before men!

 

[Carefully formulating shroud.]

 

I receive Thee, as a covering and a guard!

 

KHABS AM PEKHT!

KONX OM PAX!

LIGHT IN EXTENSION!

 

Before all magical manifestation cometh the Knowledge of the Hidden Light.

 

[Go to Pillars: give signs and words and with the Sign of Horus project your whole

will so as to realize the self fading out. The effect will be that the physical body will

become gradually and partially invisible, as though a veil or cloud were coming

between it and thee. Divine ecstasy will follow, but no loss of self-control. With

Sign of Silence use Hoor Po Krat formula* and vibrate the Grand Word.†]

 

[Repeat concentration and Mystic Circumambulation.]

 

[Intensely form shroud: stand at East and say:]

 

Thus have I formulated unto myself this shroud of Darkness and of Mystery as a

concealment and a guard.

 

O Thou, Binah, IHVH ALHIM, AIMA, AMA, Lady of Darkness and of Mystery;

Moon of the Concealèd; Divine Light that rulest in thine Own Deep Gloom: Thy

power I invoke. Come unto me and dwell within me, that I also may have poser and

control, even I, over this shroud of Darkness and of Mystery.

And now I conjure thee, O shroud of Darkness and of Mystery, that thou conceal

me from the eyes of all men, from all things of sight and sense, in this my present

purpose: which is . . .

 

O Binah, IHVH ALHIM, AMA, AIMA, Thou who art Darkness illuminated by

the Light Divine, send me Thine Archangel Tzaphquiel, Thy legions of Aralim, the

mighty angels, that I may disintegrate and scatter this shroud of darkness and of

mystery, for its work is ended for the hour.

 

I conjure thee, O shroud of darkness and of Mystery, who hast well served my

purpose, that thou now depart unto thine ancient ways. But be ye very instant and

ready, when I shall again call ye, whether by a word or a will, or by this great invocation

of your powers, to come quickly and forcibly to my behest, again to shroud me from

the eyes of men! And now I say unto ye, Depart in peace, and with the Blessing of

God the Vast and Shrouded One: and be ye very ready to come when ye are called!

 

IT IS FINISHED!

________________________________________

* Imagine yourself as Harpocrates standing upon two crocodiles.

† I.e. of 0°=0°, Har-Po-Krat.

________________________________________

 

These rituals being completed, P. left Mexico D.F., and in

the first days of the new year of 1901 he journeyed to

Ixtaccihuatl. Some time before this he had been joined by his

friend D.A., and with him he travelled to Colima and thence

to Toluca and Popocatepetl.

 

Now that we have arrived at the end of this chapter, it will

be pertinent to inquire into the progress P. made since he

passed through the 5° = 6° Ritual and became an Adeptus

Minor in the Order of the R.R. et A.C. Strictly speaking, some

time before he was officially promoted to the grade of

5°=6°, he was already a 6°=5°. In London and Paris his

works of Magical Art had caused him to be admired by his

friends and dreaded by his enemies. He had succeeded in

proving that the c of c Operation was in fact none other than

that of “The Rising on the Planes,” though in practice and

theory very different. By their study and the equilibrating

forces of the 5°=6° Ritual he was able to apply the eye of a

skilled craftsman to the dreaded* Operation of Abramelin,

________________________________________

* On this occasion the Abramelin demons appeared as misty forms filling the whole

house with a pernicious aura, which was still noticeable three years after they had been attracted.

Whether these demons are to be considered as material or mental beings depends

upon the philosophic outlook of the reader. Nevertheless, let it be understood that Abraelin

is not a work to be taken lightly. The obsession of these demons was probably one

of the chief causes of D.D.C.F.’s troubles. Frater P., in spite of his equilibrating practices

of Yoga which followed immediately upon this Operation, suffered terribly on their

account. Frater Æ.A. fled secretly from his house in terror; his gardener, a teetotaller

for twenty years, went raving drunk, as did nearly every one who lived on the estate—we

could continue examples for pages. His clairvoyants became drunkards and

prostitutes, while later a butcher upon one of whose bills the names of two demons

had been casually jotted down, viz., Elerion and Mabakiel, which respectively mean

“A laugher” and “Lamentation” (conjoint, “unlooked-for sorrow suddenly

descending upon happiness”) whilst cutting up a joint for a customer accidentally

severed the femoral artery and died in a few minutes. These mishaps are most likely

mere coincidences, but a coincidence when it happens is quite as awkward as the real

thing, and in the case of Abramelin the coincidences can be counted by scores.

________________________________________

 

and though he was never destined to accomplish this Sacred

Work in the prescribed fashion, it so far iluminated him (for

he worked astrally at it for months whilst in Mexico) as to

show him the futility of even successful Magic. He was

disgusted with his results. He had attained a rank which few

arrive at, namely, that of Adeptus Major; and now, even

though he had attained to the powers of Hecate, for which he

had so long striven, he saw that the Great Attainment lay far,

far beyond. And so it happened that by renouncing all his

magical strength to gain a greater Power, a Nobler Art, he set

forth upon the Path of the Lion that bridges the great gulf

between the two highest Grades of the Second Order, as it is

written: “A similar Fire flashingly extending through the

rushings of Air, or a Fire formless whence cometh the Image

of a Voice, or even a flashing Light abounding, revolving,

whirling forth, crying aloud. Also there is the vision of the fire

flashing Courser of Light, or also a Child, borne aloft on the

shoulders of the Celestial Steed, fiery, or clothed with gold, or

naked, or shooting with the bow shafts of Light, and standing

on the shoulders of the horse; then if thy meditation

prolongeth itself, thou shalt unite all these Symbols into the

Form of a Lion.”

 

(To be continued)