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Subject: AHA!
                                       
   The Sevenfold Mystery of the Ineffable Love; the Coming of the Lord in
   the Air as King and Judge of this corrupted World;
   
   Wherein
   
   Under the form of a Discourse between Marsyas an Adept and Olympas his
   Pupil the Whole Secret of the Way of Initiation is laid open from the
   Beginning to the End; for the Instruction of the Little Children of
   the Light.
   
   Written in Trembling and Humility for the Brethren of the A.'. A.'. by
   Their very dutiful Servant, an Aspirant to their Sublime Order,
   
   Aleister Crowley
   
THE ARGUMENTATION

   A LITTLE before Dawn, the pupil comes to greet his Master, and begs
   instruction.
   
   Inspired by his Angel, he demands the Doctrine of being rapt away into
   the Knowledge and Conversation of Him.
   
   The Master discloses the doctrine of Passive Attention or Waiting.
   
   This seeming hard to the Pupil, it is explained further, and the
   Method of Resignation, Constancy, and Patience inculcated. The Paradox
   of Equilibrium. The necessity of giving oneself wholly up the the new
   element. Egoism rebuked.
   
   The Master, to illustrate this Destruction of the Ego, describes the
   Visions of Dhyana.
   
   He further describes the defence of the Soul against assailing
   Thoughts, and shows that the duality of Consciousness is a blasphemy
   against the Unity of God; so that even the thought called God is a
   denial of God-as-He-is-in-Himself.
   
   The pupil sees nothing but a blank midnight in this Emptying of the
   Soul. He is shown that this is the necessary condition of
   Illumination. Distinction is further made between these three Dhyanas,
   and those early visions in which things appear as objective. With
   these three Dhyanas, moreover, are Four other of the Four Elements:
   and many more.
   
   Above these is the Veil of Paroketh. Its guardians.
   
   The Rosy Cross lies beyond this veil, and therewith the vision called
   Vishvarupadarshana. Moreover, there is the Knowledge and Conversation
   of the Holy Guardian Angel.
   
   The infinite number and variety of these Visions.
   
   The impossibility of revealing all these truths to the outer and
   uninitiated world.
   
   The Vision of the Universal Peacock--Atmadarshana. The confusion of
   the Mind, and the Perception of its self-contradiction.
   
   The Second Veil--the Veil of the Abyss.
   
   The fatuity of Speech.
   
   A discussion as to the means by which the vision arises in the pure
   Soul is useless; suffice it that in the impure Soul no Vision will
   arise. The practical course is therefore to cleanse the Soul.
   
   The four powers of the Sphinx; even adepts hardly attain to one of
   them!
   
   The final Destruction of the Ego.
   
   The Master confesses that he has lured the disciple by the promise of
   Joy, as the only thing comprehensible by him, although pain and joy
   are transcended even in early visions.
   
   Ananda (bliss)--and its opposite--mark the first steps of the path.
   Ultimately all things are transcended; and even so, this attainment of
   Peace is but as a scaffolding to the Palace of the King.
   
   The sheaths of the soul. The abandonment of all is necessary; the
   adept recalls his own tortures, as all that he loved was torn away.
   
   The Ordeal of the Veil of the Abyss; the Unbinding of the Fabric of
   Mind, and its ruin.
   
   The distinction between philosophical credence and interior certitude.
   
   
   Sammasati--the trance wherein the adept perceives his causal
   connection with the Universe; past, present, and future.
   
   Mastering the Reason, he becomes as a little child, and invokes his
   Holy Guardian Angel, the Augoeides.
   
   Atmadarshana arising is destroyed by the Opening of the Eye of Shiva;
   the annihilation of the Universe. The adept is destroyed, and there
   arises the Master of the Temple.
   
   The pupil, struck with awe, proclaims his devotion to the Master;
   whereat the latter bids him rather unite himself with the Augoeides.
   
   Yet, following the great annihilation, the adept reappears as an Angel
   to instruct men in this doctrine.
   
   The Majesty of the Master described.
   
   The pupil, wonder-struck, swears to attain, and asks for further
   instruction.
   
   The Master describes the Eight Limbs of Yoga.
   
   The pupil lamenting the difficulty of attainment, the Master shows
   forth the sweetness of the hermit's life.
   
   One doubt remains: will not the world be able instantly to recognise
   the Saint? The Master replies that only imperfect Saints reveal
   themselves as such. Of these are the cranks and charlatans, and those
   that fear and deny Life. But let us fix our thoughts on Love, and not
   on the failings of others!
   
   The Master invokes the Augoeides; the pupil through sympathy is almost
   rapt away.
   
   The Augoeides hath given the Master a message; namely, to manifest the
   New Way of the Equinox of Horus, as revealed in Liber Legis.
   
   He does so, and reconciles it with the Old Way by inviting the Test of
   Experiment. They would go therefore to the Desert or the
   Mountains--nay! here and now shall it be accomplished.
   
   Peace to all beings!
   
AHA!

   OLYMPAS. Master, ere the ruby Dawn
   Gild the dew of leaf and lawn,
   Bidding the petals to unclose
   Of heaven's imperishable Rose,
   Brave heralds, banners flung afar
   Of the lone and secret star,
   I come to greet thee. Here I bow
   To earth this consecrated brow!
   As a lover woos the Moon
   Aching in a silver swoon,
   I reach my lips towards thy shoon,
   Mendicant of the mystic boon!
   MARSYAS. What wilt thou?
   OLYMPAS. Let mine Angel say!
   "Utterly to be rapt away!"
   MARSYAS. How, whence, and whither?
   OLYMPAS. By my kiss
   From that abode to this--to this!"
   My wings?
   MARSYAS. Thou hast no wings. But see
   An eagle sweeping from the Byss
   Where God stands. Let him ravish thee,
   And bear thee to a boundless bliss!
   OLYMPAS. How should I call him? How beseech?
   MARSYAS. Silence is lovelier than Speech.
   Only on a windless tree
   Falls the dew, Felicity!
   One ripple on the water mars
   The magic mirror of the Stars.
   OLYMPAS. My soul bends to the athletic stress
   Of God's immortal loveliness.
   Tell me, what wit avails the clod
   To know the nearness of its God?
   MARSYAS. First, let the soul be poised, and fledge
   Truth's feather on mind's razor-edge.
   Next, let no memory, feeling, hope
   Stain all its starless horoscope.
   Last, let it be content, twice void;
   Not to be suffered or enjoyed;
   Motionless, blind and deaf and dumb---
   So may it to its kingdom come!
   OLYMPAS. Dear master, can this be? The wine
   Embittered with dark discipline?
   For the soul loves her mate, the sense.
   MARSYAS. This bed is sterile. Thou must fence
   Thy soul from all her foes, the creatures
   That by their soft and siren natures
   Lure thee to shipwreck!
   OLYMPAS. Thou hast said:
   "God is in all. "
   MARSYAS. In sooth.
   OLYMPAS. Why dread
   The Godhood?
   MARSYAS. Only as the thought
   Is God, adore it. But the soul creates
   Misshapen fiends, incestuous mates.
   Slay these: they are false shadows of
   The never-waning moon of love.
   OLYMPAS. What thought is worthy?
   MARSYAS. Truly none
   Save one, in that it is but one.
   Keep the mind constant; thou shalt see
   Ineffable felicity.
   Increase the will, and thou shalt find
   It hath the strength to be resigned.
   Resign the will; and from the string
   Will's arrow shall have taken wing,
   And from the desolate abode
   Found the immaculate heart of God!
   OLYMPAS. The word is hard!
   MARSYAS. All things excite
   Their equal and their opposite.
   Be great, and thou shalt be--how small!
   Be naught, and thou shalt be the All!
   Eat not; all meat shall fill thy mouth:
   Drink, and thy soul shall die of drouth!
   Fill thyself; and that thou seekest
   Is diluted to its weakest.
   Empty thyself; the ghosts of night
   Flee before the living Light.
   Who clutches straws is drowned; but he
   That hath the secret of the sea,
   Lives with the whole lust of his limbs,
   Takes hold of water's self, and swims.
   See, the ungainly albatross
   Stumbles awkwardly across
   Earth--one wing-beat, and he flies
   Most graceful gallant in the skies!
   So do thou leave thy thoughts, intent
   On thy new noble element!
   Throw the earth shackles off, and cling
   To what imperishable thing
   Arises from the Married death
   Of thine own self in that whereon
   Thou art fixed.
   OLYMPAS. Then all life's loyal breath
   Is a waste wind. All joy forgone,
   I must strive ever?
   MARSYAS. Cease to strive!
   Destroy this partial I, this moan
   Of an hurt beast! Sores keep alive
   By scratching. Health is peace. Unknown
   And unexpressed because at ease
   Are the Most High Congruities.
   OLYMPAS. Then death is thine "attainment"? I
   Can do no better than to die!
   MARSYAS. Indeed, that "I" that is not God
   Is but a lion in the road!
   Knowest thou not (even now!) how first
   The fetters of Restriction burst?
   In the rapture of the heart
   Self hath neither lot nor part.
   OLYMPAS. Tell me, dear master, how the bud
   First breaks to brilliance of bloom:
   What ecstasy of brain and blood
   Shatters the seal upon the tomb
   Of him whose gain was the world's loss
   Our father Christian Rosycross!
   MARSYAS. First, one is like a gnarled old oak
   On a waste heath. Shrill shrieks the wind.
   Night smothers earth. Storm swirls to choke
   The throat of silence! Hard behind
   Gathers a blacker cloud than all.
   But look! but look! it thrones a ball
   Of blistering fire. It breaks. The lash
   Of lightning snakes him forth. One crash
   Splits the old tree. One rending roar!---
   And night is darker than before.
   OLYMPAS. Nay, master, master! Terror hath
   So fierce an hold upon the path?
   Life must lie crushed, a charred black swath,
   In that red harvest's aftermath!
   MARSYAS. Life lives. Storm passes. Clouds dislimn.
   The night is clear. And now to him
   Who hath endured is given the boon
   Of an immeasurable moon.
   The air about the adept congeals
   To crystal; in his heart he feels
   One needle pang; then breaks that splendour
   Infinitely pure and tender ...
   --And the ice drags him down!
   OLYMPAS. But may
   Our trembling frame, our clumsy clay,
   Endure such anguish?
   MARSYAS. In the worm
   Lurks an unconquerable germ
   Identical. A sparrow's fall
   Were the Destruction of the All!
   More; know that this surpasses skill
   To express its ecstasy. The thrill
   Burns in the memory like the glory
   Of some far beaconed promontory
   Where no light shines but on the comb
   Of breakers, flickerings of the foam!
   OLYMPAS. The path ends here?
   MARSYAS. Ingenuous one!
   The path--the true path--scarce begun.
   When does the night end?
   OLYMPAS. When the sun,
   Crouching below the horizon,
   Flings up his head, tosses his mane,
   Ready to leap.
   MARSYAS. Even so. Again
   The adept secures his subtle fence
   Against the hostile shafts of sense,
   Pins for a second his mind; as you
   May have seen some huge wrestler do.
   With all his gathered weight heaped, hurled,
   Resistless as the whirling world,
   He holds his foeman to the floor
   For one great moment and no more.
   So--then the sun-blaze! All the night
   Bursts to a vivid orb of light.
   There is no shadow; nothing is,
   But the intensity of bliss.
   Being is blasted. That exists.
   OLYMPAS. Ah!
   MARSYAS. But the mind, that mothers mists,
   Abides not there. The adept must fall
   Exhausted.
   OLYMPAS. There's an end of all?
   MARSYAS. But not an end of this! Above
   All life as is the pulse of love,
   So this transcends all love.
   OLYMPAS. Ah me!
   Who may attain?
   MARSYAS. Rare souls.
   OLYMPAS. I see
   Imaged a shadow of this light.
   MARSYAS. Such is its sacramental might
   That to recall it radiates
   Its symbol. The priest elevates
   The Host, and instant blessing stirs
   The hushed awaiting worshippers.
   OLYMPAS. Then how secure the soul's defence?
   How baffle the besieger, Sense?
   MARSYAS. See the beleagured city, hurt
   By hideous engines, sore begirt
   And gripped by lines of death, well scored
   With shell, nigh open to the sword!
   Now comes the leader; courage, run
   Contagious through the garrison!
   Repair the trenches! Man the wall!
   Restore the ruined arsenal!
   Serve the great guns! The assailants blench;
   They are driven from the foremost trench.
   The deadliest batteries belch their hell
   No more. So day by day fought well,
   We silence gun by gun. At last
   The fiercest of the fray is past;
   The circling hills are ours. The attack
   Is over, save for the rare crack,
   Long dropping shots from hidden forts;---
   --So is it with our thoughts!
   OLYMPAS. The hostile thoughts, the evil things!
   They hover on majestic wings,
   Like vultures waiting for a man
   To drop from the slave-caravan!
   MARSYAS. All thoughts are evil. Thought is two:
   The seer and the seen. Eschew
   That supreme blasphemy, my son,
   Remembering that God is One.
   OLYMPAS. God is a thought!
   MARSYAS. The "thought" of God
   Is but a shattered emerod:
   A plague, an idol, a delusion,
   Blasphemy, schism, and confusion!
   OLYMPAS. Banish my one high thought? The night
   Indeed were starless.
   MARSYAS. Very right!
   But that impalpable inane
   Is the condition of success;
   Even as earth lies black to gain
   Spring's green and autumn's fruitfulness.
   OLYMPAS. I dread this midnight of the soul.
   MARSYAS. Welcome the herald!
   OLYMPAS. How control
   The horror of the mind? The insane
   Dead melancholy?
   MARSYAS. Trick is vain.
   Sheer manhood must support the strife,
   And the trained Will, the Root of Life,

   Bear the adept triumphant.
   OLYMPAS. Else?
   MARSYAS. The reason, like a chime of bells
   Ripped by the lightning, cracks.
   OLYMPAS. And these
   Are the first sights the magus sees?
   MARSYAS. The first true sights. Bright images
   Throng the clear mind at first, a crowd
   Of Gods, lights, armies, landscapes; loud
   Reverberations of the Light.
   But these are dreams, things in the mind,
   Reveries, idols. Thou shalt find
   No rest therein. The former three
   (Lightning, moon, sun) are royally
   Liminal to the Hall of Truth.
   Also there be with them, in sooth,
   Their brethren. There's the vision called
   The Lion of the Light, a brand
   Of ruby flame and emerald
   Waved by the Hermeneutic Hand.
   There is the Chalice, whence the flood
   Of God's beatitude of blood
   Flames. O to sing those starry tunes!
   O colder than a million moons!
   O vestal waters! Wine of love
   Wan as the lyric soul thereof!
   There is the Wind, a whirling sword,
   The savage rapture of the air
   Tossed beyond space and time. My Lord,
   My Lord, even now I see Thee there
   In infinite motion! And beyond
   There is the Disk, the wheel of things;
   Like a black boundless diamond
   Whirring with millions of wings!
   OLYMPAS. Master!
   MARSYAS. Know also that above
   These portents hangs no veil of love;
   But, guarded by unsleeping eyes
   Of twice seven score severities,
   The Veil that only rips apart
   When the spear strikes to Jesus' heart!
   A mighty Guard of Fire are they
   With sabres turning every way!
   Their eyes are millstones greater than
   The earth; their mouths run seas of blood.
   Woe be to that accursäd man
   Of whom they are the iniquities!
   Swept in their wrath's avenging flood
   To black immitigable seas!
   Woe to the seeker who shall fail
   To rend that vexful virgin Veil!
   Fashion thyself by austere craft
   Into a single azure shaft
   Loosed from the string of Will; behold
   The Rainbow! Thou art shot, pure flame,
   Past the reverberated Name
   Into the Hall of Death. Therein
   The Rosy Cross is subtly seen.
   OLYMPAS. Is that a vision, then?
   MARSYAS. It is.
   OLYMPAS. Tell me thereof!
   MARSYAS. O not of this!
   Of all the flowers in God's field
   We name not this. Our lips are sealed
   In that the Universal Key
   Lieth within its mystery.
   But know thou this. These visions give
   A hint both faint and fugitive
   Yet haunting, that behind them lurks
   Some Worker, greater than his works.
   
   Yea, it is given to him who girds
   His loins up, is not fooled by words,
   Who takes life lightly in his hand
   To throw away at Will's command,
   To know that View beyond the Veil.
   
   O petty purities and pale,
   These visions I have spoken of!
   The infinite Lord of Light and Love
   Breaks on the soul like dawn. See! See!
   Great God of Might and Majesty!
   Beyond sense, beyond sight, a brilliance
   Burning from His glowing glance!
   Formless, all the worlds of flame
   Atoms of that fiery frame!
   The adept caught up and broken;
   Slain, before His Name be spoken!
   In that fire the soul burns up.
   One drop from that celestial cup
   Is an abyss, an infinite sea
   That sucks up immortality!
   O but the Self is manifest
   Through all that blaze! Memory stumbles
   Like a blind man for all the rest.
   Speech, like a crag of limestone, crumbles,
   While this one soul of thought is sure
   Through all confusion to endure,
   Infinite Truth in one small span:
   This that is God is Man.
   OLYMPAS. Master! I tremble and rejoice.
   MARSYAS. Before His own authentic voice
   Doubt flees. The chattering choughs of talk
   Scatter like sparrows from a hawk.
   OLYMPAS. Thenceforth the adept is certain of
   The mystic mountain? Light and Love
   Are Life therein, and they are his?
   MARSYAS. Even so. And One supreme there is
   Whom I have known, being He. Withdrawn
   Within the curtains of the dawn
   Dwells that concealed. Behold! he is
   A blush, a breeze, a song, a kiss,
   A rosy flame like Love, his eyes
   Blue, the quintessence of all skies,
   His hair a foam of gossamer
   Pale gold as jasmine, lovelier
   Than all the wheat of Paradise.
   O the dim water-wells his eyes!
   There is such depth of Love in them
   That the adept is rapt away,
   Dies on that mouth, a gleaming gem
   Of dew caught in the boughs of Day!
   OLYMPAS. The hearing of it is so sweet
   I swoon to silence at thy feet.
   MARSYAS. Rise! Let me tell thee, knowing Him,
   The Path grows never wholly dim.
   Lose Him, and thou indeed wert lost!
   But He will not lose thee!
   OLYMPAS. Exhaust
   The Word!
   MARSYAS. Had I a million songs,
   And every song a million words,
   And every word a million meanings,
   I could not count the choral throngs
   Of Beauty's beatific birds,
   Or gather up the paltry gleanings
   Of this great harvest of delight!
   Hast thou not heard the word aright?
   That world is truly infinite.
   Even as a cube is to a square
   Is that to this.
   OLYMPAS. Royal and rare!
   Infinite light of burning wheels!
   MARSYAS. Ay! The imagination reels.
   Thou must attain before thou know,
   And when thou knowest--Mighty woe
   That silence grips the willing lips!
   OLYMPAS. Ever was speech the thought's eclipse.
   MARSYAS. Ay, not to veil the truth to him
   Who sought it, groping in the dim
   Halls of illusion, said the sages
   In all the realms, in all the ages,
   "Keep silence. " By a word should come
   Your sight, and we who see are dumb!
   We have sought a thousand times to teach
   Our knowledge; we are mocked by speech.

   So lewdly mocked, that all this word
   Seems dead, a cloudy crystal blurred,
   Though it cling closer to life's heart
   Than the best rhapsodies of art!
   OLYMPAS. Yet speak!
   MARSYAS. Ah, could I tell thee of
   These infinite things of Light and Love!
   There is the Peacock; in his fan
   Innumerable plumes of Pan!
   Oh! every plume hath countless eyes;
   --Crown of created mysteries!---
   Each holds a Peacock like the First.
   OLYMPAS. How can this be?
   MARSYAS. The mind's accurst.
   It cannot be. It is. Behold,
   Battalion on battalion rolled!
   There is war in Heaven! The soul sings still,
   Struck by the plectron of the Will;
   But the mind's dumb; its only cry
   The shriek of its last agony!
   OLYMPAS. Surely it struggles.
   MARSYAS. Bitterly!
   And, mark! it must be strong to die!
   The weak and partial reason dips
   One edge, another springs, as when
   A melting iceberg reels and tips
   Under the sun. Be mighty then,
   A lord of Thought, beyond wit and wonder
   Balanced--then push the whole mind under,
   Sunk beyond chance of floating, blent
   Rightly with its own element,
   Not lifting jagged peaks and bare
   To the unsympathetic air!
   
   This is the second veil; and hence
   As first we slew the things of sense
   Upon the altar of their God,
   So must the Second Period
   Slay the ideas, to attain
   To that which is, beyond the brain.
   OLYMPAS. To that which is?--not thought? not sense?
   MARSYAS. Knowledge is but experience
   Made conscious of itself. The bee,
   Past master of geometry,
   Hath not one word of all of it;
   For wisdom is not mother-wit!
   So the adept is called insane
   For his frank failure to explain.
   Language creates false thoughts; the true
   Breed language slowly. Following
   Experience of a thing we knew
   Arose the need to name the thing.
   So, ancients likened a man's mind
   To the untamed evasive wind.
   Some fool thinks names are things; and boasts
   Aloud of spirits and of ghosts.
   Religion follows on a pun!
   And we, who know that Holy One
   Of whom I told thee, seek in vain
   Figure or word to make it plain.
   OLYMPAS. Despair of man!
   MARSYAS. Man is the seed
   Of the unimaginable flower.
   By singleness of thought and deed
   It may bloom now--this actual hour!
   OLYMPAS. The soul made safe, is vision sure
   To rise therein?
   MARSYAS. Though calm and pure
   It seem, maybe some thought hath crept
   Into his mind to baulk the adept.
   The expectation of success
   Suffices to destroy the stress
   Of the one thought. But then, what odds?
   "Man's vision goes, dissolves in God's;"
   Or, "by God's grace the Light is given
   To the elected heir of heaven. "
   These are but idle theses, dry
   Dugs of the cow Theology.
   Business is business. The one fact
   That we know is: the gods exact
   A stainless mirror. Cleanse thy soul!
   Perfect the will's austere control!
   For the rest, wait! The sky once clear,
   Dawn needs no prompting to appear!
   OLYMPAS. Enough! it shall be done.
   MARSYAS. Beware!
   Easily trips the big word "dare. "
   Each man's an OEdipus, that thinks
   He hath the four powers of the Sphinx,
   Will, Courage, Knowledge, Silence. Son,
   Even the adepts scarce win to one!
   Thy Thoughts--they fall like rotten fruits.
   But to destroy the power that makes
   These thoughts--thy Self? A man it takes
   To tear his soul up by the roots!
   This is the mandrake fable, boy!
   OLYMPAS. You told me that the Path was joy.
   MARSYAS. A lie to lure thee!
   OLYMPAS. Master!
   MARSYAS. Pain
   And joy are twin toys of the brain.
   Even early visions pass beyond!
   OLYMPAS. Not all the crabbed runes I have conned
   Told me so plain a truth. I see,
   Inscrutable Simplicity!
   Crushed like a blind-worm by the heel
   Of all I am, perceive, and feel,
   My truth was but the partial pang
   That chanced to strike me as I sang.
   MARSYAS. In the beginning, violence
   Marks the extinction of the sense.
   Anguish and rapture rack the soul.
   These are disruptions of control.
   Self-poised, a brooding hawk, there hangs
   In the still air the adept. The bull
   On the firm earth goes not so smooth!
   So the first fine ecstatic pangs
   Pass; balance comes.
   OLYMPAS. How wonderful
   Are these tall avenues of truth!
   MARSYAS. So the first flash of light and terror
   Is seen as shadow, known as error.
   Next, light comes as light; as it grows
   The sense of peace still steadier glows;
   And the fierce lust, that linked the soul
   To its God, attains a chaste control.
   Intimate, an atomic bliss,
   Is the last phrasing of that kiss.
   Not ecstasy, but peace, pure peace!
   
   Invisible the dew sublimes
   From the great mother, subtly climbs
   And loves the leaves! Yea, in the end,
   Vision all vision must transcend.
   These glories are mere scaffolding
   To the Closed Palace of the King.
   OLYMPAS. Yet, saidst thou, ere the new flower shoots
   The soul is torn up by the roots.
   MARSYAS. Now come we to the intimate things
   Known to how few! Man's being clings
   First to the outer. Free from these
   The inner sheathings, and he sees
   Those sheathings as external. Strip
   One after one each lovely lip
   From the full rose-but! Ever new
   Leaps the next petal to the view.
   What binds them by Desire? Disease
   Most dire of direful Destiny's!
   OLYMPAS. I have abandoned all to tread
   The brilliant pathway overhead!
   MARSYAS. Easy to say. To abandon all,
   All must be first loved and possessed.
   Nor thou nor I have burst the thrall.
   All--as I offered half in jest,
   Sceptic--was torn away from me.
   Not without pain! THEY slew my child,
   Dragged my wife down to infamy
   Loathlier than death, drove to the wild
   My tortured body, stripped me of
   Wealth, health, youth, beauty, ardour, love.
   Thou has abandoned all? Then try
   A speck of dust within the eye!
   OLYMPAS. But that is different!
   MARSYAS. Life is one.
   Magic is life. The physical
   (Men name it) is a house of call
   For the adept, heir of the sun!
   Bombard the house! it groans and gapes.
   The adept runs forth, and so escapes
   That ruin!
   OLYMPAS. Smoothly parallel
   The ruin of the mind as well?
   MARSYAS. Ay! Hear the Ordeal of the Veil,
   The Second Veil! ... O spare me this
   Magical memory! I pale
   To show the Veil of the Abyss.
   Nay, let confession be complete!
   OLYMPAS. Master, I bend me at thy feet---
   Why do they sweat with blood and dew?
   MARSYAS. Blind horror catches at my breath.
   The path of the abyss runs through
   Things darker, dismaller than death!
   Courage and will! What boots their force?
   The mind rears like a frightened horse.
   There is no memory possible
   Of that unfathomable hell.
   Even the shadows that arise
   Are things to dreadful to recount!
   There's no such doom in Destiny's
   Harvest of horror. The white fount
   Of speech is stifled at its source.
   Know, the sane spirit keeps its course
   By this, that everything it thinks
   Hath causal or contingent links.
   Destroy them, and destroy the mind!
   O bestial, bottomless, and blind
   Black pit of all insanity!
   The adept must make his way to thee!
   This is the end of all our pain,
   The dissolution of the brain!
   For lo! in this no mortar sticks;
   Down come the house--a hail of bricks!
   The sense of all I hear is drowned;
   Tap, tap, isolated sound,
   Patters, clatters, batters, chatters,
   Tap, tap, tap, and nothing matters!
   Senseless hallucinations roll
   Across the curtain of the soul.
   Each ripple on the river seems
   The madness of a maniac's dreams!
   So in the self no memory-chain
   Or causal wisp to bind the straws!
   The Self disrupted! Blank, insane,
   Both of existence and of laws,
   The Ego and the Universe
   Fall to one black chaotic curse.
   OLYMPAS. So ends philosophy's inquiry:
   "Summa scientia nihil scire. "
   MARSYAS. Ay, but that reasoned thesis lacks
   The impact of reality.
   This vision is a battle axe
   Splitting the skull. O pardon me!
   But my soul faints, my stomach sinks.
   Let me pass on!
   OLYMPAS. My being drinks
   The nectar-poison of the Sphinx.
   This is a bitter medicine!
   MARSYAS. Black snare that I was taken in!
   How one may pass I hardly know.
   Maybe time never blots the track.
   Black, black, intolerably black!
   Go, spectre of the ages, go!
   Suffice it that I passed beyond.
   I found the secret of the bond
   Of thought to thought through countless years
   Through many lives, in many spheres,
   Brought to a point the dark design
   Of this existence that is mine.
   I knew my secret. "All I was"
   I brought into the burning-glass,
   And all its focussed light and heat
   Charred "all I am. " The rune's complete
   When "all I shall be" flashes by
   Like a shadow on the sky.
   
   Then I dropped my reasoning.
   Vacant and accursed thing!
   By my Will I swept away
   The web of metaphysic, smiled
   At the blind labyrinth, where the grey
   Old snake of madness wove his wild
   Curse! As I trod the trackless way
   Through sunless gorges of Cathay,
   I became a little child.
   By nameless rivers, swirling through
   Chasms, a fantastic blue,
   Month by month, on barren hills,
   In burning heat, in bitter chills,
   Tropic forest, Tartar snow,
   Smaragdine archipelago,
   See me--led by some wise hand
   That I did not understand.
   Morn and noon and eve and night
   I, the forlorn eremite,
   Called on Him with mild devotion,
   As the dew-drop woos the ocean.
   
   In my wanderings I came
   To an ancient park aflame
   With fairies' feet. Still wrapped in love
   I was caught up, beyond, above
   The tides of being. The great sight
   Of the intolerable light
   Of the whole universe that wove
   The labyrinth of life and love
   Blazed in me. Then some giant will,
   Mine or another's thrust a thrill
   Through the great vision. All the light
   Went out in an immortal night,
   The world annihilated by
   The opening of the Master's Eye.
   How can I tell it?
   OLYMPAS. Master, master!
   A sense of some divine disaster
   Abases me.
   MARSYAS. Indeed, the shrine
   Is desolate of the divine!
   But all the illusion gone, behold
   The one that is!
   OLYMPAS. Royally rolled,
   I hear strange music in the air!
   MARSYAS. It is the angelic choir, aware
   Of the great Ordeal dared and done
   By one more Brother of the Sun!
   OLYMPAS. Master, the shriek of a great bird
   Blends with the torrent of the thunder.
   MARSYAS. It is the echo of the word
   That tore the universe asunder.
   OLYMPAS. Master, thy stature spans the sky.
   MARSYAS. Verily; but it is not I.
   The adept dissolves--pale phantom form
   Blown from the black mouth of the storm.
   It is another that arises!
   OLYMPAS. Yet in thee, through thee!
   MARSYAS. I am not.
   OLYMPAS. For me thou art.
   MARSYAS. So that suffices
   To seal thy will? To cast thy lot
   Into the lap of God? Then, well!
   OLYMPAS. Ay, there is no more potent spell.
   Through life, through death, by land and sea
   Most surely will I follow thee.
   MARSYAS. Follow thyself, not me. Thou hast
   An Holy Guardian Angel, bound
   to lead thee from thy bitter waste
   To the inscrutable profound
   That is His covenanted ground.
   OLYMPAS. Thou who hast known these master-keys
   Of all creation's mysteries,
   Tell me, what followed the great gust
   Of God that blew his world to dust?
   MARSYAS. I, even I the man, became
   As a great sword of flashing flame.
   My life, informed with holiness,
   Conscious of its own loveliness,
   Like a well that overflows
   At the limit of the snows,
   Sent its crystal stream to gladden
   The hearts of me, their lives to madden
   With the intoxicating bliss
   (Wine mixed with myrrh and ambergris!)
   Of this bitter-sweet perfume,
   This gorse's blaze of prickly bloom
   That is the Wisdom of the Way.
   Then springs the statue from the clay,
   And all God's doubted fatherhood
   Is seen to be supremely good.
   
   Live within the sane sweet sun!
   Leave the shadow-world alone!
   OLYMPAS. There is a crown for every one;
   For every one there is a throne!
   MARSYAS. That crown is Silence. Sealed and sure!
   That throne is Knowledge perfect pure.
   Below that throne adoring stand
   Virtues in a blissful band;
   Mercy, majesty and power,
   Beauty and harmony and strength,
   Triumph and splendour, starry shower
   Of flames that flake their lily length,
   A necklet of pure light, far-flung
   Down to the Base, from which is hung
   A pearl, the Universe, whose sight
   Is one globed jewel of delight.
   Fallen no more! A bowered bride
   Blushing to be satisfied!
   OLYMPAS. All this, of once the Eye unclose?
   MARSYAS. The golden cross, the ruby rose
   Are gone, when flaming from afar
   The Hawk's eye blinds the Silver Star.
   
   O brothers of the Star, caressed
   By its cool flames from brow to breast,
   Is there some rapture yet to excite
   This prone and pallid neophyte?
   OLYMPAS. O but there is no need of this!
   I burn toward the abyss of Bliss.
   I call the Four Powers of the Name;
   Earth, wind and cloud, sea, smoke and flame
   To witness: by this triune Star
   I swear to break the twi-forked bar.
   But how to attain? Flexes and leans
   The strongest will that lacks the means.
   MARSYAS. There 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 tense the thought.
   Next, let the breath-rhythm be 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 entity.
   Watch every thought that springs; enhance
   Hour after hour thy vigilance!
   Intense and keen, turned inward, miss
   No atom of analysis!
   Sixth, on one thought securely pinned
   Still every whisper of the wind!
   So like a flame straight and unstirred
   Burn up thy being in one word!
   Next, still that ecstasy, prolong
   Thy meditation steep and strong,
   Slaying even God, should He distract
   Thy attention from the chosen act!
   Last, all these things in one o'erpowered,
   Time that the midnight blossom flowered!
   The oneness is. Yet even in this,
   My son, thou shalt not do amiss
   If thou restrain the expression, shoot
   Thy glance to rapture's darkling root,
   Discarding name, form, sight, and stress
   Even of this high consciousness;
   Pierce to the heart! I leave thee here:
   Thou art the Master. I revere
   Thy radiance that rolls afar,
   O Brother of the Silver Star!
   OLYMPAS. Ah, but no ease may lap my limbs.
   Giants and sorcerers oppose;
   Ogres and dragons are my foes!
   Leviathan against me swims,
   And lions roar, and Boreas blows!
   No Zephyrs woo, no happy hymns
   Paean the Pilgrim of the Rose!
   MARSYAS. I teach the royal road of light.
   Be thou, devoutly eremite,
   Free of thy fate. Choose tenderly
   A place for thine Academy.
   Let there be an holy wood
   Of embowered solitude
   By the still, the rainless river,
   Underneath the tangled roots
   Of majestic trees that quiver
   In the quiet airs; where shoots
   Of the kindly grass are green
   Moss and ferns asleep between,
   Lilies in the water lapped,
   Sunbeams in the branches trapped
   --Windless and eternal even!
   Silenced all the birds of heaven
   By the low insistent call
   Of the constant waterfall.
   There, to such a setting be
   Its carven gem of deity,
   A central flawless fire, enthralled
   Like Truth within an emerald!
   Thou shalt have a birchen bark
   On the river in the dark;
   And at the midnight thou shalt go
   to the mid-stream's smoothest flow,
   And strike upon a golden bell
   The spirit's call; then say the spell:
   "Angel, mine angel, draw thee nigh!"
   Making the Sign of Magistry
   With wand of lapis lazuli.
   Then, it may be, through the blind dumb
   Night thou shalt see thine angel come,
   Hear the faint whisper of his wings,
   Behold the starry breast begemmed
   With the twelve stones of the twelve kings!
   His forehead shall be diademed
   With the faint light of stars, wherein
   The Eye gleams dominant and keen.
   Thereat thou swoonest; and thy love
   Shall catch the subtle voice thereof.
   He shall inform his happy lover:
   My foolish prating shall be over!
   OLYMPAS. O now I burn with holy haste.
   This doctrine hath so sweet a taste
   That all the other wine is sour.
   MARSYAS. Son, there's a bee for every flower.
   Lie open, a chameleon cup,
   And let Him suck thine honey up!
   OLYMPAS. There is one doubt. When souls attain
   Such an unimagined gain
   Shall not others mark them, wise
   Beyond mere mortal destinies?
   MARSYAS. Such are not the perfect saints.
   While the imagination faints
   Before their truth, they veil it close
   As amid the utmost snows
   The tallest peaks most straitly hide
   With clouds their holy heads. Divide
   The planes! Be ever as you can
   A simple honest gentleman!
   Body and manners be at ease,
   Not bloat with blazoned sanctities!
   Who fights as fights the soldier-saint?
   And see the artist-adept paint!
   Weak are those souls that fear the stress
   Of earth upon their holiness!
   They fast, they eat fantastic food,
   They prate of beans and brotherhood,
   Wear sandals, and long hair, and spats,
   And think that makes them Arahats!
   How shall man still his spirit-storm?
   Rational Dress and Food Reform!
   OLYMPAS. I know such saints.
   MARSYAS. An easy vice:
   So wondrous well they advertise!
   O their mean souls are satisfied
   With wind of spiritual pride.
   They're all negation. "Do not eat;
   What poison to the soul is meat!
   Drink not; smoke not; deny the will!
   Wine and tobacco make us ill. "
   Magic is life; the Will to Live
   Is one supreme Affirmative.
   These things that flinch from Life are worth
   No more to Heaven than to Earth.
   Affirm the everlasting Yes!
   OLYMPAS. Those saints at least score one success:
   Perfection of their priggishness!
   MARSYAS. Enough. The soul is subtlier fed
   With meditation's wine and bread.
   Forget their failings and our own;
   Fix all our thoughts on Love alone!
   
   Ah, boy, all crowns and thrones above
   Is the sanctity of love.
   In His warm and secret shrine
   Is a cup of perfect wine,
   Whereof one drop is medicine
   Against all ills that hurt the soul.
   A flaming daughter of the Jinn
   Brought to me once a wingäd scroll,
   Wherein I read the spell that brings
   The knowledge of that King of Kings.
   Angel, I invoke thee now!
   Bend on me the starry brow!
   Spread the eagle wings above
   The pavilion of our love! ....
   Rise from your starry sapphire seats!
   See, where through the quickening skies
   The oriflamme of beauty beats
   Heralding loyal legionaries,
   Whose flame of golden javelins
   Fences those peerless paladins.
   There are the burning lamps of them,
   Splendid star-clusters to begem
   The trailing torrents of those blue
   Bright wings that bear mine angel through!
   O Thou art like an Hawk of Gold,
   Miraculously manifold,
   For all the sky's aflame to be
   A mirror magical of Thee!
   The stars seem comets, rushing down
   To gem thy robes, bedew thy crown.
   Like the moon-plumes of a strange bird
   By a great wind sublimely stirred,
   Thou drawest the light of all the skies
   Into thy wake. The heaven dies
   In bubbling froth of light, that foams
   About thine ardour. All the domes
   Of all the heavens close above thee
   As thou art known of me who love thee.
   Excellent kiss, thou fastenest on
   This soul of mine, that it is gone,
   Gone from all life, and rapt away
   Into the infinite starry spray
   Of thine own AEon ... Alas for me!
   I faint. Thy mystic majesty
   Absorbs this spark.
   OLYMPAS. All hail! all hail!
   White splendour through the viewless veil!
   I am drawn with thee to rapture.
   MARSYAS. Stay!
   I bear a message. Heaven hath sent
   The knowledge of a new sweet way
   Into the Secret Element.
   OLYMPAS. Master, while yet the glory clings
   Declare this mystery magical!
   MARSYAS. I am yet borne on those blue wings
   Into the Essence of the All.
   Now, now I stand on earth again,
   Though, blazing through each nerve and vein,
   The light yet holds its choral course,
   Filling my frame with fiery force
   Like God's. Now hear the Apocalypse
   New-fledged on these reluctant lips!
   OLYMPAS. I tremble like an aspen, quiver
   Like light upon a rainy river!
   MARSYAS. Do what thou wilt! is the sole word
   Of law that my attainment heard.
   Arise, and lay thine hand on God!
   Arise, and set a period
   Unto Restriction! That is sin:
   To hold thine holy spirit in!
   O thou that chafest at thy bars,
   Invoke Nuit beneath her stars
   With a pure heart (Her incense burned
   Of gums and woods, in gold inurned),
   And let the serpent flame therein
   A little, and thy soul shall win
   To lie within her bosom. Lo!
   Thou wouldst give all--and she cries: No!
   Take all, and take me! Gather spice
   And virgins and great pearls of price!
   Worship me in a single robe,
   Crowned richly! Girdle of the globe,
   I love thee! Pale and purple, veiled,
   Voluptuous, swan silver-sailed,
   I love thee. I am drunkness
   Of the inmost sense; my soul's caress
   Is toward thee! Let my priestess stand
   Bare and rejoicing, softly fanned
   By smooth-lipped acolytes, upon
   Mine iridescent altar-stone,
   And in her love-chaunt swooningly
   Say evermore: To me! To me!
   I am the azure-lidded daughter
   Of sunset; the all-girdling water;
   The naked brilliance of the sky
   In the voluptuous night am I!
   With song, with jewel, with perfume,
   Wake all my rose's blush and bloom!
   Drink to me! Love me! I love thee,
   My love, my lord--to me! to me!
   OLYMPAS. There is no harshness in the breath
   Of this--is life surpassed, and death?
   MARSYAS. There is the Snake that gives delight
   And Knowledge, stirs the heart aright
   With drunkenness. Strange drugs are thine,
   Hadit, and draughts of wizard wine!
   These do no hurt. Thine hermits dwell
   Not in the cold secretive cell,
   But under purple canopies
   With mighty-breasted mistresses
   Magnificent as lionesses--
   Tender and terrible caresses!
   Fire lives, and light, in eager eyes;
   And massed huge hair about them lies.
   They lead their hosts to victory:
   In every joy they are kings; then see
   That secret serpent coiled to spring
   And win the world! O priest and king,
   Let there be feasting, foining, fighting,
   A revel of lusting, singing, smiting!
   Work; be the bed of work! Hold! Hold!
   the stars' kiss is as molten gold.
   Harden! Hold thyself up! now die---
   Ah! Ah! Exceed! Exceed!
   OLYMPAS. And I?
   MARSYAS. My stature shall surpass the stars:
   He hath said it! Men shall worship me
   In hidden woods, on barren scaurs,
   Henceforth to all eternity.
   OLYMPAS. Hail! I adore thee! Let us feast.
   MARSYAS. I am the consecrated Beast.
   I build the Abominable House.
   The Scarlet Woman is my Spouse--
   OLYMPAS. What is this word?
   MARSYAS. Thou canst not know
   Till thou hast passed the Fourth Ordeal.
   OLYMPAS. I worship thee. The moon-rays flow
   Masterfully rich and real
   From thy red mouth, and burst, young suns
   Chanting before the Holy Ones
   Thine Eight Mysterious Orisons!
   MARSYAS. The last spell! The availing word!
   The two completed by the third!
   The Lord of War, of Vengeance
   That slayeth with a single glance!
   This light is in me of my Lord.
   His Name is this far-whirling sword.
   I push His order. Keen and swift
   My Hawk's eye flames; these arms uplift
   The Banner of Silence and of Strength--
   Hail! Hail! thou art here, my Lord, at length!
   Lo, the Hawk-Headed Lord am I:
   My nemyss shrouds the night-blue sky.
   Hail! ye twin warriors that guard
   The pillars of the world! Your time
   Is nigh at hand. The snake that marred
   Heaven with his inexhaustible slime
   Is slain; I bear the Wand of Power,
   The Wand that waxes and that wanes;
   I crush the Universe this hour
   In my left hand; and naught remains!
   Ho! for the splendour in my name
   Hidden and glorious, a flame
   Secretly shooting from the sun.
   Aum! Ha!--my destiny is done.
   The Word is spoken and concealed.
   OLYMPAS. I am stunned. What wonder was revealed?
   MARSYAS. The rite is secret.
   OLYMPAS. Profits it?
   MARSYAS. Only to wisdom and to wit.
   OLYMPAS. The other did no less.
   MARSYAS. Then prove
   Both by the master-key of Love.
   The lock turns stiffly? Shalt thou shirk
   To use the sacred oil of work?
   Not from the valley shalt thou test
   The eggs that line the eagle's nest!
   Climb, with thy life at stake, the ice,
   The sheer wall of the precipice!
   Master the cornice, gain the breach,
   And learn what next the ridge can teach!
   Yet--not the ridge itself may speak
   The secret of the final peak.
   OLYMPAS. All ridges join at last.
   MARSYAS. Admitted,
   O thou astute and subtle-witted!
   Yet one--loose, jaggäd, clad in mist!
   Another--firm, smooth, loved and kissed
   By the soft sun! Our order hath
   This secret of the solar path,
   Even as our Lord the Beast hath won
   The mystic Number of the Sun.
   OLYMPAS. These secrets are too high for me.
   MARSYAS. Nay, little brother! Come and see!
   Neither by faith nor fear nor awe
   Approach the doctrine of the Law!
   Truth, Courage, Love, shall win the bout,
   And those three others be cast out.
   OLYMPAS. Lead me, Master, by the hand
   Gently to this gracious land!
   Let me drink the doctrine in,
   An all-healing medicine!
   Let me rise, correct and firm,
   Steady striding to the term,
   Master of my fate, to rise
   To imperial destinies;
   With the sun's ensanguine dart
   Spear-bright in my blazing heart,
   And my being's basil-plant
   Bright and hard as adamant!
   MARSYAS. Yonder, faintly luminous,
   The yellow desert waits for us.
   Lithe and eager, hand in hand,
   We travel to the lonely land.
   There, beneath the stars, the smoke
   Of our incense shall invoke
   The Queen of Space; and subtly She
   Shall bend from Her infinity
   Like a lambent flame of blue,
   Touching us, and piercing through
   All the sense-webs that we are
   As the aethyr penetrates a star!
   Her hands caressing the black earth,
   Her sweet lithe body arched for love,
   Her feet a Zephyr to the flowers,
   She calls my name--she gives the sign
   That she is mine, supremely mine,
   And clinging to the infinite girth
   My soul gets perfect joy thereof
   Beyond the abysses and the hours;
   So that--I kiss her lovely brows;
   She bathes my body in perfume
   Of sweat .... O thou my secret spouse,
   Continuous One of Heaven! illume
   My soul with this arcane delight,
   Volumptuous Daughter of the Night!
   Eat me up wholly with the glance
   Of thy luxurious brilliance!
   OLYMPAS. The desert calls.
   MARSYAS. Then let us go!
   Or seek the sacramental snow,
   Where like a high-priest I may stand
   With acolytes on every hand,
   The lesser peaks--my will withdrawn
   To invoke the dayspring from the dawn,
   Changing that rosy smoke of light
   To a pure crystalline white;
   Though the mist of mind, as draws
   A dancer round her limbs the gauze,
   Clothe Light, and show the virgin Sun
   A lemon-pale medallion!
   Thence leap we leashless to the goal,
   Stainless star-rapture of the soul.
   So the altar-fires fade
   As the Godhead is displayed.
   Nay, we stir not. Everywhere
   Is our temple right appointed.
   All the earth is faery fair
   For us. Am I not anointed?
   The Sigil burns upon the brow
   At the adjuration--here and now.
   OLYMPAS. The air is laden with perfumes.
   MARSYAS. Behold! It beams--it burns--it blooms.
   *****
   OLYMPAS. Master, how subtly hast thou drawn
   The daylight from the Golden Dawn,
   Bidden the Cavernous Mount unfold
   Its Ruby Rose, its Cross of Gold;
   Until I saw, flashed from afar,
   The Hawk's eye in the Silver Star!
   MARSYAS. Peace to all beings. Peace to thee,
   Co-heir of mine eternity!
   Peace to the greatest and the least,
   To nebula and nenuphar!
   Light in abundance be increased
   On them that dream that shadows are!
   OLYMPAS. Blessing and worship to The Beast,
   The prophet of the lovely Star!

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