Matter, then, may be defined as the impact upon sense of that prismatic ray which we have called nature. To apply this discussion to the subject in hand: Magic is a sort of parody of reality. And when we recognize that Creation proceeds from within outwards, or endogenously; and that matter is not the objective but the subjective side of the universe, we are in a position to perceive that in order magically to control matter, we must apply our efforts not to matter itself, but to our own minds. The natural world affects us from without inwards: the magical world affects us from within outwards: instead of objects suggesting ideas, ideas are made to suggest objects. And as, in the former case, when the object is removed the idea vanishes; so in the latter case, when the idea is removed, the object vanishes. Both objects are illusions; but the illusion in the first instance is the normal illusion of sense, whereas in the second instance it is the abnormal illusion of mind. The above argument can at best serve only as a hint to such as incline seriously to investigate the subject, and perhaps as a touchstone for testing the validity of a large and noisy mass of pretensions which engage the student at the outset of his enquiry. Many of these pretensions are the result of ignorance; many of deliberate intent to deceive; some, again, of erroneous philosophical theories. The Tibetan adepts seem to belong either to the second or to the last of these categories,--or, perhaps, to an impartial mingling of all three. They import a cumbrous machinery of auras, astral bodies, and elemental spirits; they divide man into seven principles, nature into seven kingdoms; they regard spirit as a refined form of matter, and matter as the one absolute fact of the universe,--the alpha and omega of all things. They deny a supreme Deity, but hold out hopes of a practical deityship for the majority of the human race. In short, their philosophy appeals to the most evil instincts of the soul, and has the air of being ex-post-facto; whenever they run foul of a prodigy, they invent arbitrarily a fanciful explanation of it. But it will be found, I think, that the various phases of hypnotism, and a systematized use of spiritism, will amply account for every miracle they actually bring to pass.