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Very natural, the irritation in your last! You write: ---
"But why? Why all this elaborate symbolism? Why not say
straight out
15^ WEH NOTE: Expound here a bit to clarify Crowley's
attitude toward race.
refer to Chapter LXXIII.
32
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MAGIC WITHOUT TEARS
56
what you mean? Surely the subject is difficult enough in
any case --- must
you put on a mask to make it clear? I know you well enough
by now to be
sure that you will not fob me off with any Holy-Willie
nonsense about the
ineffable, about human language being inadequate to reveal
such Mysteries,
about the necessity of constructing a new language to
explain a new
system of thought; of course I know that this had to be done
in the case
of chemistry, of higher mathematics, indeed of almost all
technical sub-
jects; but I feel that you have some other, deeper
explanation in reserve.
After all, most of what I am seeking to learn from you has
been familiar
to many of the great minds of humanity for many centuries.
Indeed, the
Qabalah is a special language, and that is old enough; there
is not much
new material to fit into that structure. But why did they,
in the first
place, resort to this symbolic jargon?"
You put it very well; and when I think it over, I feel far
from sure
that the explanation which I am about to inflict upon you
will satisfy
you, or even whether it will hold water! In the last
resort, I shall
have to maintain that we are justified by experience, by the
empirical
success in communicating thought which has attended, and
continues to
attend, our endeavors.
But to give a complete answer, I shall have to go back to
the beginning,
and restate the original problem; and I beg that you will
not suppose
that I am evading the question, or adopting the Irish method
of answer-
ing it by another, though I know it may sound as if I were.
Let me set out by restating our original problem; what we
want is Truth;
we want an even closer approach to Reality; and we want to
discover and
discuss the proper means of achieving this object.
Very good; let us start by the simplest of all possible
enquiries --- and
the most difficult --- "What is anything?" "What do we
know?" and other
questions that spring naturally from these.
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MAGIC WITHOUT TEARS
57
I see a tree..
I hear it --- rustling or creaking in the wind.
I touch it --- hard.
I smell it --- acrid.
I taste it --- bitter.
Now all the information given by these five senses has to be
put together,
although no two agree in any sort of way. The logic by
which we build up
our complex idea of a tree has more holes than a sponge.
But this is to jump far ahead: we must first analyze the
single, simple
impression. "I see a tree." This phenomenon is what is
called a "point-
event." It is the coming together of the two, the seer and
the seen. It
is single and simple; yet we cannot conceive of either of
them as any-
thing but complex. And the Point-Event tells us nothing
whatever about
either; both, as Herbert Spencer and God knows how many
others have
shown, unknowable; it stands by itself, alone and aloof. It
has happened;
it is undeniably Reality. Yet we cannot confirm it; for it
can never
happen again precisely the same. What is even more
bewildering is that
since it takes time for the eye to convey an impression to
the conscious-
ness (it may alter in 1,000 ways in the process!) all that
really exists
is a memory of the Point-Event. not the Point-Event itself.
what then is
this Reality of which we are so sure? Obviously, it has not
got a name,
since it never happened before, or can happen again! To
discuss it at
33
all we must invent a name, and this name (like all names)
cannot possibly
be anything more than a symbol.
Even so, as so often pointed out, all we do is to "record
the behaviour
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MAGIC WITHOUT TEARS
58
of our instruments." Nor are we much better off when we've
done it; for
our symbol, referring as it does to a phenomenon unique in
itself, and
not to be apprehended by another, can mean nothing to one's
neighbors.
What happens, of course, is that similar, though not
identical, Point-
Events happen to many of us, and so we are able to construct
a symbolic
language. My memory of the mysterious Reality resembles
yours suffi-
ciently to induce us to agree that both belong to the same
class.
But let me furthermore ask you to reflect on the formation
of language
itself. Except in the case of onomato-poetic words and a
few others,
there is no logical connection between a thing and the sound
of our name
for it. "Bow-wow" is a more rational name than "dog", which
is a mere
convention agreed on by the English, while other nations
prefer chien,
hund, cane, kalb, kutta and so on. All symbols, you see, my
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