"[1b] Some scepticism, perhaps, may be
permitted as to the validity of the latter part of this statement, and
the former may be qualified by the proviso that such things are only
of value in the right education of the will, if they are, indeed, genuine,
and not merely artificial, symbols. But the writer, as I think will be
admitted, has grasped the essential point, and, to conclude our excursion,
as we began it, with a definition, I will say that _the power of the
talisman is the power of the mind (or imagination) brought into activity
by means of a suitable symbol_.
[1] ELIHU RICH: _The Occult Sciences_, p. 346.
[2] I may refer the reader to my _A Mathematical Theory of Spirit_
(1912), chap. i., for a more adequate statement.
[1b] ELIPHAS LEVI: _Transcendental Magic: its Doctrine and Ritual_
(trans. by A. E. WAITE, 1896), p. 234.
VII
CEREMONIAL MAGIC IN THEORY AND PRACTICE
THE word "magic," if one may be permitted to say so, is itself almost
magical--magical in its power to conjure up visions in the human mind.
For some these are of bloody rites, pacts with the powers of darkness,
and the lascivious orgies of the Saturnalia or Witches' Sabbath; in other
minds it has pleasanter associations, serving to transport them from the
world of fact to the fairyland of fancy, where the purse of FORTUNATUS,
the lamp and ring of ALADDIN, fairies, gnomes, jinn, and innumerable other
strange beings flit across the scene in a marvellous kaleidoscope of
ever-changing wonders.
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