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Page 129 of 1301929 · PDF PAGE 362
…the object of reaching Madrid; and I reflected that many such steps must seem wasted, many leading away from the beeline, that I did not know the road and had no idea what Madrid would be like when I reached it. All I could do was to take each step steadily, fearlessly, firmly and determinedly, trusting to the scanty information to be gathered from signposts and strangers, to keep more or less on the right road, {583} and to take my chance of being satisfied with the unknown city which I had chosen as my goal with no reason beyond my personal w…
1929 · PDF PAGE 388
…I did not exist, and that all my ideas were illusions, inane and insane. I felt these facts as facts. It was the difference between book knowledge and experience. It seemed incredible that I should ever have fancied that I or anything else had any bearing on each other. All things were alike as shadows sweeping across the still surface of a lake -- - their images had no meaning for the water, no power to stir its silence. At ten minuted to ten I returned to the Aethyr. I was instantly blotted in blackness. Mine Angel whispered the secret words …
1906 · PDF PAGE 215
…ast. But what does any miracle prove? If the Affaire Cana were proved to me, I should merely record the facts: Water may under certain unknown conditions become wine. It is a pity that the owner of the secret remains silent, and entirely lamentable that he should attempt to deduce from his scientific knowledge cosmic theories which have nothing whatever to do with it. Suppose Edison, having perfected the phono- graph, had said, ‘‘I alone can make dumb things speak ; argal, Iam God."’ What would the world have said if telegraphy had been ex- plo…
1905 · PDF PAGE 232
…ary and spiritual experts will however readily detect minor differences in the treat- ment. It will be sufficient if I state that “the Unknown,” whether minstrel, pilgrim, or Egyptian sage, represents Tannhduser in his true Self,—the ‘‘Only Being in an Abyss of Light!” The Tannhduser who talks is the ‘‘Only Being in an Abyss of Darkness,” the natural man ignorant of his identity with the Supreme Being. The various other characters are all little parts of Tannhiauser’s own consciousness and not real persons at all: whether good or bad, all alike…
1904 · PDF PAGE 74
…t. But what does any miracle prove ? If the Affaire Cana were proved to me, I should merely record the facts : Water may under certain unknown conditions become wine. It is a pity that the owner of the secret remains silent, and entirely lamentable that he should attempt to deduce from his scientific knowledge cosmic theories which have nothing whatever to do with it. Suppose Edison, having perfected the phono- graph, had said, “I alone can make dumb things speak ; argal, I am God.” What would the world have said if telegraphy had been ex- ploi…
1904 · PDF PAGE 70
… , ram . etc.9—“Thou, as I, art God (for this is the esoteric meaning of the common Hindu saluation). A long road and a heavy price ! To know is always a difficult work . . . Hullo ! Bravo ! Thy name (I have seen) is written in the stars. Come with me, pupil ! I will give thee medicine for the mind.” * The Phallus of Shiva th e Destro yer. It is really identical with the Qabalistic “Middle Pillar” of the “Tree of Life.” † An imaginary lady to whom Sairey Gamp in Dickens’ “Martin Chuzzlewit” used to appeal. ‡ Vide the daily papers of June-July 1…
1929 · PDF PAGE 47
…hat is, I had a direct intuition that it was so. It was not merely that it seemed improbable that it could be normal audition. I did not know at the time for certain that this was impossible, {97} though it was afterwards proved to be so by experiment. I had no reason for supposing the danger to be urgent: but I rushed madly to the top of the cliff, along it and down to the Grass Traverse. I reached her in time to save her life, though there were not many seconds to spare. She had shifted her position to to get a better view and had wandered of…
1929 · PDF PAGE 50
…o do so. Their craft was traditional; one man learnt from another by rule of thumb. Confront any guide with any mountain that he did not know by habit, and he was at sea. How was it, then, that the mountains had ever been climbed at all? And the answer to that was that the general standard of climbing was, given good weather conditions, altogether beneath contempt from the standpoint of the pioneers in England and Wales. The ordinary way up any Swiss mountain is little more than a scramble. Eckenstein used to say that he would take a cow up the…
1929 · PDF PAGE 266
…had not brought any of the things of which we stood in such need. Their behaviour was utterly unintelligible. The doctor did not seem to know what he was saying; his remarks were merely confusedly irritated. He did not seem to be able to answer any of my questions or give any explanation of what had happened in the past. His one idea was to hold a durbar and have himself elected leader in my place. There was no provision in our agreement for any such folly. He pointed out that it was merely a scrap of paper. When the others arrived, an excited …
1929 · PDF PAGE 558
558 imagine anyone asinine or abject enough to make it a beverage. The luck still held. I don't know whether it disinfected him, but it certainly made him as sick as a sewer. He pulled through and I am only sorry not to be able to say, in the present edition, what happened next. I cannot be serious and yet I am honestly sad beyond expression whenever the man comes up in my mind. His character was charming as few other men I ever met. His talent for writing, though limited by his moral weakness to trivialities, possessed many admirable qualities…
1929 · PDF PAGE 192
…her sixty-eight days on the glacier, two days longer than any other member of the party. It was another world's record; and, as far as I know, stands to this hour. I hope I may be allowed to die in peace with it. It would be a sorry ambition in anyone to grasp my laurels and I can assure him that to refrain will bring its own reward. Of these sixty-eight days, eight only were fine, and of these no three were consecutive. Of course some days were of mixed character. But in no case have I classed as bad weather any days which would be considered …
1929 · PDF PAGE 115
… instinctively that my pious predecessors were wrong in demanding the suppression of manhood and imposing arbitrary codes of conduct. (I know now, of course, that their instructions have been misunderstood; every element in one's molecule must be developed to the utmost and applied to the service of one's true will.) I suppose I have to thank Stevenson for the idea, which was this. As a member of the Second Order, I wore a certain jewelled ornament of gold upon my heart. I arranged that when I had it on, I was to permit no thought, word or acti…
1929 · PDF PAGE 582
…Their principal liar was poor Dartnell, but he was ably assisted by some Dutch interpreter whose name I had never heard. He pretended to know me well. In one article, he let himself go about my cynical audacity in returning to London. He had seen me in Holborn, a decrept derelict, hardly able to walk. This was fine! My only difficulty in believing everything he said was that at the time of my visit to London I was lying ill at Cefalu.
1929 · PDF PAGE 255
…ice. It contained comparatively few clothes; boots, axes, rifles, revolvers, scientific instruments and books made up the tale. I do not know how much it weighed, because the baggage clerk at Calcutta had asked me to bribe him with a rupee to declare it below the free allowance; but I should have been very sorry to have to do more than set it up on end unaided. A young girl coolie took it on her back, as I might have done a rucksack, and carried it at a good steady pace up the steep narrow paths to the Woodlands Hotel. I no longer disbelieved t…
1907 · PDF PAGE 248
…st as the fletcher shapes his shaft, il. 46 ICHEPHRA, thou Beetle-headed God, iil. 17 Kiss me, O sister, kiss me down to death! ili, 121 Know ye my children? breast, ill. 149 From the old strong LApDy, awake the dread abyss, iii. 15 Last night—but the boy shrieked, ii. 71 Lay them together for the sake of Love, i. 37 Let me give a rapid resumé of what we have gone through, ii. 260 Let me help Babu Chander Grish up, ii. 148 Let me pass out beyond the city gate, i. 30 Let no ill memory of an ancient wrong, i. 71 Let the far music of oblivious yea…
1929 · PDF PAGE 535
…e source of his error is in the instrument of sight itself. He might well say, "But if, as you tell me, this green lamp is red, how do I know that it is a lamp, not a tiger? I have only my eyes to depend on." I found it impossible to persuade even the most intelligent people who came to me to take the first step --- that of clearing the ground of their minds of every preconceived idea. They yearned for me to fill them up to the neck with any ridiculous rubbish that flattered their vanity, fed their folly, doped their dread of death and damnatio…
1929 · PDF PAGE 245
…o my amazement, having gone into the bathroom to bathe, I discovered a beetle. As I have said, I take no interest in natural history and know nothing of it. But this beetle attracted my attention at once. I had never seen anything like it before. It was about an inch and a half long and had a single horn nearly as long as itself. The horn ended in a small sphere suggestive of an eye. From the moment, for about a fortnight, there was an absolute plague of these beetles. They were not merely in the house, they were on the rocks, {408} in the gard…
1929 · PDF PAGE 554
…in Sydney and went on to San Francisco, where, free from all guidance or control, he broke out into a series of spasms of which I do not know the details, and which are of little interest as being merely casual symptoms of a state of mind which I had already studied sufficiently. I asked myself, "How now?" Has Thelema failed in this case? I have thought this over ruthlessly, but my final judgment is that the Law is not touched by these events. It seems to me beyond dispute that any conceivable code of conduct presumes implicitly that men always…
1929 · PDF PAGE 516
…mah might be in irreconcilable antagonism with those of Ruach. I was not in any way shaken in my opinion that the crown of Ruach (Daäth, Knowledge) had no true place on the Tree of Life, that it was essentially illusory and self-contradictory. It had been my constant preoccupation to find a means of expression for the truth of spiritual illumination in terms of rational comprehension, and moreover to justify the former without denying the validity of the later. Professor Thompson's remarks filled me with hope. It must be remembered that at the …
1929 · PDF PAGE 71
…ense of the word, but a convict who had learnt all his climbing from Eckenstein at the request of the ne'er-do-weel's family, who didn't know what to do with him and probably hoped that he would kill himself on the mountains. The Alpine Club even tried to fake records. One party made a great fuss over and ascent of the Dent Blanche. It was proved later that they had not been on the mountain at all and that one at least of the party --- Smith quidam --- knew it. Again, when I arrived at the head of the Baltoro glacier, I questioned some of my co…