The history of magic : $b including a clear and precise exposition of its procedure, its rites and its mysteriesLévi, Éliphas
Religion
The history of magic : $b including a clear and precise exposition of its procedure, its rites and its mysteries
Lévi, Éliphas
Magic -- History
form it is an artificial phosphorus, containing the concentrated
virtues of all generative heat. (12) When condensed by a triple fire it
resolves into oil, and this oil is the Universal Medicine. It can then
only be contained in glass, this being a non-conductor.
Again, here is a clear issue at its value, and I make this
qualification because the Astral Light is, as I have said, a
speculation, and personally I neither know nor care whether such a
fluid exists, or, in such case, whether it is applicable to the uses
indicated. It is enough that Éliphas Lévi has made his affirmations
concerning it in unmistakable language.
Let us pass therefore to the _Histoire de la Magie_, though I have
been borrowing from it already in respect of the putative universal
fluid. Magic therein is still the science of the ancient Magi; it is
still the exact and absolute science of Nature and her laws, because
it is the science of equilibrium. Its secret, the secret of occult
science, is that of God’s omnipotence. It comprises all that is most
certain in philosophy, all that is eternal and infallible in religion.
It is the Sacerdotal Art and the Royal Art. Its chief memorial is
found in Kabalism, but it derives apparently from primeval Zoroastrian
doctrine, of which Abraham seems to have been a depositary. This
doctrine attained its perfection in Egypt. Thereafter, on its religious
side, the succession appears to have been: (_a_) from Egypt to Moses;
(_b_) from Moses to Solomon, through certain custodians of the secret
law in Jewry; (_c_) from the Temple at Jerusalem to St. Peter’s at
Rome, though the method of transition is obscure—as that which was
affirmed previously is still maintained, namely, that Rome has lost the
Kabalistic Keys. It is naturally left to our conjecture as to when the
Church possessed them—from Éliphas Lévi’s point of view, perhaps in
the days of Dionysius, perhaps in those of Synesius, but not from my
standpoint, and so the question remains.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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