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Page 1 of 31912 · PDF PAGE 28
I4 your surroundings. You will say: “Good heavens! I must have been to sleep!” or else “What on earth was I meditating upon?” or even “What was I doing?” “Where am I?” “Who am I?” or a mere wordless bewilderment may daze you. This may alarm you, and your alarm will not be lessened when you come to full consciousness, and reflect that you have actually forgotten who you are and what you are doing! This is only one of many adventures that may come to you ; but it is one of the most typical. By this time your hours of meditation will fill most of th…
1912 · PDF PAGE 72
56 the mind, so that the object is altogether forgotten, perhaps for whole minutes at a time; and at other times the object itselfwill begin to play all sorts of tricks. Suppose you have chosen a white cross. It will move its bar up and down, elongate the bar, turn the bar oblique, get its arms unequal, turn upside down, grow branches, get a crack around it or a figure upon it, change its shape altogether like an Amoeba,change its size and distance as a whole, change the degree of its illumination, and at the same time change its colour. It will…
1912 · PDF PAGE 41
…ch knowledgehas not yet been published. However, one may safely assert that since the great men previously mentioned did not do this, it will not be necessary for their followers. Let us then choose a suitable position, and consider what happens. There is a sort of happy medium between rigidity and limpness; the muscles are not to be strained; and yet they are not allowed to be altogether slack. It is difficult to find a good descriptive word. Braced is perhaps the best. A sense of physical alertness is desirable. Think of the tiger about to spri…
1912 · PDF PAGE 74
… cases of smallpox, the reason being that people began to tell the truth about the disease instead of faking. Soon, however, the control will improve faster than the observation. When this occurs the improvementwill become apparent in the record. Any variation will probably be due to accidental circumstances; for example, one night you may be very tired when you start; another night you may have headache or indigestion. You will do well to avoid practising at such times. We will suppose, then, that you have reached the stage when your average p…
1912 · PDF PAGE 42
…ly to wonder what all the fuss is about, perhaps to think that he is specially gifted. Similarly a man who has never touched a golf club will take his umbrella and carelessly hole a putt which would frighten the best putter alive. In a few days, however, in all cases, the discomforts will begin. As you go on, they will begin earlier in the course of the hour’s exercise. The disinclination to practise at all may become almost unconquerable. One must warn the student against imagining that some other position would be easier to master than the on…
1912 · PDF PAGE 27
…on is comfortable, though we never noticed it before in all our lives! This difficulty has been solved by a practice called Arcana, which will be described later on. Memories of the events of the day will bother us ; we must arrange our day so that it is absolutely uneventful. Our minds will recall to us our hopes and fears, our loves and hates, our ambitions, our envies, and many other emotions. All these must be cut off. We must have absolutely no interest in life but that of quieting our minds. This is the object of the usual monastic vow of …
1912 · PDF PAGE 43
27 sciousness, and that consciousness a consciousness ofpain; and at this moment one will further realize with an indescribable feel- ing of relief that not only is this position, which has been so painful, the very ideal of physical comfort, but that all other conceivable positions of the body are uncomfortable. This feeling represents success. There will be no further difficulty in the practice. One Will get into one’s Asana with almost the same feeling as that with which a tired man gets into a hot bath; and While he is in that position, the …
1912 · PDF PAGE 29
I5 Almost always, the moment that one becomes conscious of this, it stops, and the dreary old struggle between the cowboy will and the buckjumper mind begins again. Like every other physiological process, consciousness of it implies disorder or disease. In analysing the nature of this work of controlling the mind, the student will appreciate without trouble the fact that two things are involved—the person seeing and the thing seen—the person knowing and the thing known; and he will come to regard this as the necessary condition of all conscious…
1912 · PDF PAGE 101
…d physiology which has apparently no reference to the facts of the dissecting-room. Prominent in this class are the seven Cakkras, which will be described in Part II. There are also various “ nerves”, equally mythical. The second class is ob./eois ofdooofz'ofz, such as the idea or form of the Deity, or the heart or body of your Teacher, or of some man whom you respect profoundly. This practice is not to be commended, because it implies a bias of the mind. You can also meditate on your dreams. This sounds superstitious; but the idea is that you …
1912 · PDF PAGE 67
… is given in Liber III. If Sections I and 2 are practised (if necessary with the assistance of another person to aid your vigilance) you will soon be able to master the final section. In some people this inhibitory power may flower suddenly in very much the same way as occurred with Asana. Quite without any relaxa- tion of vigilance, the mind will suddenly he stilled. There will be a marvellousfeeling of peace and rest, quite different from the lethargic feeling which is produced by over-eating. It is difficult to say whether so definite a result w…
1912 · PDF PAGE 26
12 external influences are likely to be unfavourable. New faces, new scenes will disjturb us ; even the new habits of life which we undertake for this very purpose of controlling the mind will at first tend to upset it. Still, we must give up our habit of eating too much, and follow the natural rule of only eating when we are hungry, listening to the interior voice which tells us that we have had enough. The same rule applies to sleep. We have determined to control our minds, and so our time for meditation must take precedence of other hours. We …
1912 · PDF PAGE 38
…re is that which is steady and easy.” And again, “any posture which is steady and easy is an Asana; there is no other rule.” Any posture will do. In a sense this is true, because any posture becomes uncomfortable sooner or later. The steadiness and easiness mark a definite attain- ment, as will be explained later on. Hindu books, such as the “Shiva Sanhita,” give countless postures; many, perhaps most of them, im- possible for the average adult European. Others insist that the head, neck, and spine should be kept vertical and straight, for reaso…
1912 · PDF PAGE 11
…E are seven keys to the great gate, Being eight in one and one in eight. First, let the body of thee be still, Bound by the cerements of will, Corpse-rigid; thus thou mayst abort The fidget-babes that tease the thought. Next, let the breath-rhythmbe low, Easy, regular, and slow; So that thy being be in tune With the great sea’s Pacific swoon. Third, let thy life be pure and calm, Swayed softly as a windless palm. Fourth, let the will-to-live be bound To the one love of the profound. Fifth, let the thought, divinely free From sense, observe its en…
1912 · PDF PAGE 89
73 say in this place, that Dhyana has to be classed as the most vivid and catastrophic of all experiences. This will be con- firmed by any one who has been there. It is, then, difficult to overrate the value that such an experience has for the individual, especially as it is his entire conception of things, including his most deep—seated conception, the standard to which he has always referred everything, his own self, that is overthrown; and when we try to explain it away as hallucination, temporary suspension of the faculties or something simil…
1912 · PDF PAGE 73
…t week it may seem rather amusing, and you may even imagine you are progressing; but as the practice teaches you what you are doing, you will apparently get worse and worse. Please understand that in doing this practice you are sup- posed to be seated in Asana, and to have note-book and pencil by your side, and a watch in front of you. You are not to practise at first for more than ten minutes at a time, so as to avoid risk of overtiring the brain. In fact you will probably find that the Whole of your will-power is not equal to keeping to a sub- …
1912 · PDF PAGE 112
ORDER FORM Part [fofz‘lzz's BOOK FOUR [“ MAGICK ”] 2's ire Με Press, eme! will 66 paélz's/zea’ as early as possiéle. Ora’ers s/zoa/a’ öe sem‘ in at 07168 2‘0 WIELAND AND Co.
1912 · PDF PAGE 47
CHAPTER Π PRANAYAMA AND ITS PARALLEL IN SPEECH, MANTRAYOGA HE connection between breath and mind will be fully discussed in speaking of the Magick Sword, but it may be useful to premise a few details of a practical character. You may consult various Hindu manuals, and the writings of Kwang Tze, for various notable theories as to method and result. But in this sceptical system one had better content one’s self with statements which are not worth the trouble of doubting. The ultimate idea of meditation being to still the mind, it may be considere…
1912 · PDF PAGE 7
…ments of his casual conversation may prove alike more intelligible and more convincing, and at least provide a pre- liminary study which will enable the student to attack his real work from a standpoint of some little general knowledge and understanding of his ideas, and of the form in which he figures them. Part II, “ Magick,” is more advanced in style than Part I ; the student is expected to know a little of the literature of the subject, and to be able to take an intelligent View of it. This part is, however, really explanatory of Part I, whi…
1912 · PDF PAGE 71
…all into the sun. The moment then that the student takes a simple subject—or rather a simple object—and imagines it or visualizes it, he will find that it is not so much his creature as he supposed. Other thoughts will invade 55
1912 · PDF PAGE 59
…but every- body’s mind is hopelessly muddled on this subject, which some people confuse with erotology, and others with sociology. There will be no clear thinking on this matter until it is understood as being solely a branch of athletics. We may then dismiss Yama and Niyama with this advice: let the student decide for himself what form of life, what moral code, will least tend to excite his mind; but once he has for- mulated it, let him stick to it, avoiding opportunism ; and let him be very careful to take no credit for what he does or refrai…