Page:Konx Om Pax.pdf/134
in qualities, but these differences and progressive states have nothing to do with the sudden awakening of the faculty which lies beyond reason—that faculty of seeing clearly through the magical appearances surrounding us and perceiving the cause beyond the falsity of its effects. Mr. Crowley says, apropos of this, "It is no doubt more difficult to learn 'Paradise Lost' by heart than 'We are Seven'; but when you have done it you are no better at figure skating." He quotes as the great guiding scripture of his life a Buddhist Sutta (ii, 33): "Therefore, O Ananda, be ye lamps unto yourselves. Be ye a refuge to yourselves. Betake yourself to no external refuge."
How is this inward mystery revealed? The answer is in the East by Yoga, and in the West by Magic; in the East by an entirely artificial and scientific method, in the West by a stimulation and sudden outflowing of the poetic faculty. The East, we may take it, is almost entirely static, whilst the West is wholely dynamic:
Life flees
Down corridors of centuries
Pillar by pillar, and is lost.
Life after life in wild appeal
Cries to the master; he remains
And thinks not.
···
Bright Sun of Knowledge, in me rise,
Lead me to those exalted skies
To live and love and understand!
Paying no price, accepting nought
The Giver and the Gift are one
With the Receiver.
Such are some of the sensations described by Aleister Crowley in his quest for the discovery of his Relation with the Absolute. His power of expression is extraordinary; his kite flies, but he never fails to jerk it back to earth with some touch of ridicule or bathos which makes it still an open question whether he will excite that life-giving animosity on the part of Public Opinion which, as we have hinted, is only accorded to the most dangerous thinkers.
Mr. Anderson writes: There is something fishy about all this. I like it.
CHISWICK PRESS: CHARLES WHITTINGHAM AND CO., TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE, LONDON.