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1904 · PDF PAGE 2

Mr. Crowley and The Creeds

MR. CROWLEY AND THE CREEDS (BY G. K. CHESTERTON) Mr. Aleister Crowley publishes a work, “ The Sword of Song : Called by Christians ‘ The Book of the Beast,’ ” and called, I am ashamed to say, “ Ye Sword of Song ” on the cover, by some singularly uneducated man. Mr. Aleister Crowley has always been, in my opinion, a good poet ; his “ Soul of Osiris,” written during an Egyptian mood, was better poetry than this Browningesque rhapsody in a Buddhist mood ; but this also, though very affected, is very interesting. But the main fact about it is that …

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1904 · PDF PAGE 3

Mr. Crowley and The Creeds

…stian religion is that it is hated. To bring me as a witness to this colossal enthymeme, he has the sublime cou- rage to state that my “ Sword of Song ” begins with an effort to expound Buddhism, but that my hatred of Christianity overcame me as I went on, and

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1904 · PDF PAGE 6

Mr. Crowley and The Creeds

…” I take this to mean : “ You have no business to take the Bible literally ! ” I have dealt with this contention at some length in the “ Sword of Song ” itself (Ascension Day, lines 216 to 247) : but here I will simply observe that a poem which authorises the Archbishop of Canterbury to convey Dr. Clifford’s pet trowels, and makes possible the Gilbertian (in the old sense of pertaining to W. S. Gilbert) position of the Free Kirk to-day, is a poem which had better be burnt, as the most sensible man of his time proposed to do with Homer, or at le…

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