Book 4 (Part II)

22 bottom Malkuth. The height of the Altar is equal to the height above the ground of the navel of the Magician. The Altar is connected with the Ark of the Covenant, Noah's Ark, the nave {navis^ a ship) of the Church, and many other symbols of antiquity, whose symboUsm has been well worked out in an anonymous book called "The Canon," (Elkin Mathews), which should be studied carefully before constructing the Altar. For this Altar must embody the Magician's knowledge of the laws of Nature, which are the laws through which he works. He should endeavour to make geometrical constructions to symbolize cosmic measurements. For example, he may take the two diagonals as (say) the diameter of the sun. Then the side of the altar will be found to have a length equal to some other cosmic measure, a vesica drawn on the side some other, a "rood cross" within the vesica yet another. Each Magician should work out his own system of symbolism —and he need not confine himself to cosmic measurements. He might, for example, find some relation to express the law of inverse squares. The top of the Altar shall be covered with gold, and on this gold should be engraved some such figure as the Holy Oblation, or the New Jerusalem, or, if he have the skill, the Microcosm of Vitruvius, of which we give illustrations. On the sides of the Altar are also sometimes drawn the great tablets