Magick in Theory and Practice (Section 1)

devoted one’s incarnation to discharging the liabilities of one part of one’s previous character. For instance, one might devote a lifetime to settling the bill run up b y Napoléon for causing un- necessary suffering, with the object of starting afresh, clear of debt, in a life devoted to reaping the reward of the Corsican’s invaluable services to the race. The Master Therion, in fact, rernembers several incarnations of almost uncompensated wretchedness, anguish and humiliation, voluntarily undertaken so that he might résumé his work un- hampered by spiritual creditors. These are the stigmata. Memory is hall-marked by its corre- spondence with the facts actually observed in the présent. This correspondence may be of two kinds. It is rare (and it is unimpor- tant for the reasons stated above) that one s memory should be confirmed by what may be called, contemptuously, external evidence. It was indeed a reliable contribution to psychology to remark that an evil and adulterous génération sought for a sign. (Even so, the permanent value of the observation is to trace the genealogy of the Pharisee — from Caiaphas to the modem Christian.) Signs mislead, from “Painless Dentistry” upwards. The fact that anything is intelligible proves that it is addressed to the wrong quarter, because the very existence of language présupposés impotence to communicate directly. When Walter Raleigh flung his cloak upon the muddy road, he merely expressed, in a cipher contrived by a combination of circumstances, his otherwise inex- pressible wish to get on good terms with Queen Elizabeth. The significance of his action was determined by the concourse of circumstances. The reality can hâve no reason for reproducing itself exclusively in that especial form. It can hâve no reason for remembering that so extravagant a ritual happened to be necessary to worship. Therefore, however well a man might remember his incarnation as Julius Caesar, there is no necessity for his representing his power to set ail upon the hazard of a die by imagining the Rubicon. Any spiritual State can be symbolized by an infinité variety of actions in an infinité variety of circum¬ stances. One should recollect only those events which happen to 56 —