On such intellectual and moral heights it will be understood that the human mind and heart enter into the deep peace. “Peace profound, my brethren”—such was the master-word of High-Grade Masonry, being the association of Kabalistic initiates.[18]
The war which the Church has been forced to make against Magic was necessitated by the profanations of false Gnostics, but the true science of the Magi is catholic essentially, basing all its realisation on the hierarchic principle. Now, the only serious and absolute hierarchy is found in the Catholic Church, and hence true adepts have always shewn for it the deepest respect and obedience. Henry Khunrath alone was a resolute protestant, but in this he was a German of his period rather than a mystic citizen of the eternal Kingdom.[19]
The essence of anti-christianity is exclusion and heresy; it is the partition of the body of Christ, according to the beautiful expression of St. John: Omnis spiritus qui solvit Christum hic Antichristus est. The reason is that religion is charity and that there is no charity in anarchy. Magic had also its anarchists, its makers and adherents of sects, its thaumaturgists and sorcerers. Our design is to vindicate the legality of the science from the usurpations of ignorance, fraud and folly; it is in this respect more especially that our work will stand to be useful, as it will be also entirely new. So far the History of Magic has been presented as annals of a thing prejudged, or as chronicles—less or more exact—of a sequence in phenomena, seeing that no one believed that Magic belonged to science. A serious account of this science in its rediscovery, so to speak, must set forth its developments or progress. We are walking in open sanctuary instead of among ruins, and we find that the Holy Places, so long buried under the débris of four civilisations, have been preserved more wonderfully than the mummified cities which excavation has unearthed, in all their dead beauty and desolate majesty, beneath the lava of Vesuvius.
Bossuet in his magnificent work has shewn us religion bound up everywhere with history; but what would he have said had he known that a science which, in a sense, was born with the world, provides an explanation of primeval dogmas, belonging to the one and universal religion, in virtue of their combination with the most incontestable theorems of mathematics and reason? Dogmatic Magic is the key of all secrets as yet unfathomed by the philosophy of history, while Practical Magic alone opens the Secret Temple of Nature to that power of human will which is ever limited, yet ever progressive.
We are far from any impious pretence of explaining the mysteries of religion by means of Magic, but our intention is to indicate after what manner science is compelled to accept and revere those mysteries.[20] It shall be said no longer that reason must humble itself in the presence of faith; on the contrary, it must do honour to itself by believing, since it is faith which saves reason from the horrors of the void on the brink of the abyss, and it is its bond of union with the infinite. Orthodoxy in religion is respect for the hierarchy as the sole guardian of unity. Let us therefore not fear to repeat that Magic is essentially the Science of the Hierarchy, remembering clearly that, before all things else, it condemns anarchic doctrines, while it demonstrates, by the very laws of Nature, that harmony is inseparable both from power and authority.
The chief attraction of Magic for the great number of curious persons is that they see therein an exceptional means for the satisfaction of their passions. The unbeliever’s horizon is of the same order. The avaricious would deny that there is any secret of Hermes corresponding to the transmutation of metals, for otherwise they would buy it and so enjoy wealth. But they are fools who believe that such a secret is sold. Of what use would be money to those who could make gold? That is true, says the sceptic, but if you, Éliphas Lévi, possessed it, would you not be richer than we are? Who has told you that I am poor? Have I asked for anything at your hands? Where is the sovereign in the world who can boast that he has acquired from me any secret of science? Where is the millionaire whom I have given reason to believe that I would set my fortune against his? When we look at earthly wealth from beneath it, we may yearn for it as the sovereign felicity, but it is despised when we consider it from above and when one realises how little temptation there can be to recover that which has been dropped as if it were hot iron.
But apart from this, a young man will exclaim that if magical secrets were true, he would attain them that he might be loved by all women. Nothing of the sort; a day will come, poor child, when it will be too much to be loved by one of them, for sensual desire is a dual orgie, the intoxication of which causes disgust to supervene quickly, after which anger and separation follow. There was once an old idiot who would have liked to have become a magician in order to upset the world. But if you were a magician, my hero, you would not be an imbecile, and before the tribunal of your conscience you would find no extenuating circumstances, did you become a criminal.
The Epicurean, on his part, demands the recipes of Magic, that he may enjoy for ever and suffer nothing at all. In this case the science itself intervenes and says, as religion also says: Blessed are those who suffer. But that is the reason why the Epicurean has lost faith in religion. “Blessed are those who mourn”—but the Epicurean scoffs at the promise. Hear now what is said by experience and by reason. Sufferings test and awaken generous sentiments; pleasures promote and fortify base instincts. Sufferings arm against pleasure; enjoyment begets weakness in suffering. Pleasure squanders; pain ingarners. Pleasure is man’s rock of peril; the pain of motherhood is woman’s triumph. Pleasure fertilises and conceives but pain brings forth.[21] Woe to him who cannot and will not suffer; he shall be overwhelmed by pain. Nature drives unmercifully those who will not walk; we are cast into life as into an open sea: we must swim or drown. Such are the laws of Nature, as taught by Transcendent Magic. And now reconsider whether one can become a magician in order to enjoy everything and suffer nothing. Yet the world will ask: In such case, what profits Magic? What would the prophet Balaam have replied to his she-ass had the patient brute asked him what profits intelligence? What would Hercules have answered to a pigmy if he had inquired what profits strength? We do not compare worldly people to pigmies and still less to Balaam’s ass: it would be wanting in politeness and good taste. We say therefore, with all possible graciousness, to such brilliant and amiable people, that for them Magic is absolutely useless, it being understood further that they will never take it seriously. Our work is addressed to souls that toil and think. They will find an explanation therein of whatsoever has remained obscure in our Doctrine and Ritual. On the pattern of the Great Masters, we have followed the rational order of sacred numbers in the plan and division of our works, for which reason this History of Magic is arranged in seven books, having seven chapters in each. The first book is dedicated to the Sources of Magic; it is the genesis of that science, and we have provided it with a key in the letter Aleph expressing Kabalistically the original and primal unity. The second book contains historical and social formulæ of the magical word in antiquity; its seal is the letter Beth, symbolising the duad as an expression of the word which realises, the special character of the Gnosis and occultism. The third book is concerned with the realisations of antique science in Christian society. It shews after what manner, even for science itself, the word takes flesh. The number three is that of generation, of realisation, and the key of this book is the letter Gimel, a hieroglyph of birth. We are introduced in the fourth book to the civilising power of Magic among barbarous races, to the natural productions of this science amidst peoples still in their childhood, to the mysteries of Druids and their miracles, to the legends of bards, and it is shewn after what manner these things concurred in the formation of modern societies, thus preparing a brilliant and permanent victory for Christianity. The number four expresses Nature and force, while the letter Daleth, which stands for it in the Hebrew alphabet, is represented in that of the Kabalists by an emperor on his throne. The fifth book is consecrated to the sacerdotal era of the middle ages, and we are present at the dissensions and struggles of science, the formation of secret societies, their unknown achievements, the secret rites of grimoires, the mysteries of the Divine Comedy, the divisions within the sanctuary which must lead later on to a glorious unity. The number five is that of the quintessence, religion and the priesthood; its character is the letter He, represented in the magical alphabet by the symbol of a high priest. The sixth book exhibits the intervention of Magic in the work of the Revolution. The number six is that of antagonism and strife in preparation for universal synthesis, and the corresponding letter is Vau, symbol of the creative lingam and the reaper’s sickle. The seventh book is synthetic, containing an exposition of modern workings and discoveries, new theories on light and magnetism, the revelation of the great Rosicrucian secret, the explanation of mysterious alphabets, the science of the word and its magical works, in fine, the summary of the science itself, including an appreciation of what has been accomplished by contemporaneous mystics. This book is the complement and the crown of the work, as the septenary is the crown of numbers, uniting the triangle of idea to the square of form. Its corresponding letter is Zain, and the Kabalistic hieroglyphic is a victor mounted on a chariot, drawn by two sphinxes.[22]
Far from us be the ridiculous vanity of posing as a Kabalistic victor; it is the science alone which should triumph; and that which we expose before the intelligent world, mounted on the cubic chariot and drawn by sphinxes, is the Word of Light, the Divine Fulfiller of the Mosaic Kabalah, the human Sun of the Gospel, that man-God who has come once as Saviour and will manifest soon as Messiah, that is, as definitive and absolute king of temporal institutions. It is this thought which animates our courage and sustains our hope. But now it remains to submit all our conceptions, all our discoveries and all our labours to the infallible judgment of the hierarchy. To the authorised men of science be that which belongs to science, but the things which connect with religion are set apart to the Church alone and to that one hierarchic Church, the preserver of unity, which has been catholic, apostolic and Roman from the days of Christ Jesus to our own. To scholars our discoveries, to bishops our aspirations and beliefs. Woe to the child who believes himself wiser than his parents, to the man who acknowledges no masters, to that dreamer who thinks and prays by himself. Life is an universal communion and in such communion do we find immortality. He who isolates himself is given over to death thereby and an eternity of isolation would be eternal death.
Éliphas Lévi.