Initiation Into Hermetics
Magic Psychic Training (VII)
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| Magic Psychic Training (VII) A very particular topic we shall deal with in this Step concerns the development of the astral senses with regard to the elements. The magician’s astral senses have been trained and developed in any case in the course of all the preceding exercises; nevertheless there is need of an extraordinary drill in cases of poor abilities for one or the other faculty, because every human being has different talents. Therefore it will be opportune to quote exercises here that enable the magician to develop the sense of the astral body fast and without difficulty. In the magic mental training of Step VI, the scholar learned to become conscious of his spirit and to act as a spirit through the astral body as well as through the material one. In pursuance of this, I will deal with one of the most fascinating problems, namely that of clairvoyance. Numerous books have been published about this theme, but the ones that have come into my hands do not offer the slightest practical profit to any magician. Therefore it is very useful indeed to labor very thoroughly in the field of clairvoyance. Generally speaking, clairvoyance mean the second sight as it is popularly named, or the power of seeing, without the use of the eye, events taking place at a distance and in the past, present or future, or seeing deceased people. Very few authors describe this power from a psychological or any other point of view, and that is why it shall be out next task to study the phenomenon of clairvoyance very thoroughly. First of all the magician will realize that there are various kinds of clairvoyance. The principle kind is the inborn capacity of clairvoyance which its bearer has been granted whether in the invisible world already, or which he brought with him from a former into his present existence. This kind of clairvoyance is the best, but very few humans enjoy it, being born clairvoyant to such a degree that they can practice it immediately without any effort at all. A second kind of clairvoyance is that which occurs spontaneously and is therefore to be regarded as a pathological symptom. A shock in the case of severe illness also can cause the capacity of clairvoyance. This usually happens in the case of people who lose their equilibrium as the result of a stroke, a nervous breakdown, or otherwise through a physical or psychic trauma where a kind of clairvoyance will occur in a more or less distinctive form as a concomitance. This sort of clairvoyance is naturally undesirable for the magician because it will sooner or later lead to a complete breakdown, which not only implies a total loss of this power, but also is detrimental to the health and very often the cause of an untimely death. Clairvoyants of this kind are very pitiable indeed, even if their success should be convincing proof. This capacity belongs to all the persons who, having a mediumistic predisposition, were induced to clairvoyance by some beings. Nor is this kind recommendable to the magic practitioner, because people like this usually end up in a lunatic asylum. A great number of persons who are taken to mental hospitals and who were meddling with spiritualism without a reliable guide can blame their hopeless condition on spiritualism, and it does not matter in the least whether the motives of this study were earnest intentions or mere curiosity or whatever else may have induced them. Another kid of clairvoyance that belongs to this group is the forced production of this power with the help of drugs like opium, hashish, peyote, soma, etc. This will be without any interest to the magician, because most of these victims will fall prey to the addiction of these dangerous drugs, which paralyze the ethical and intellectual faculties, the willpower and finally the nervous system, injuring the health as well as the development. Such cases are recorded by the millions in the Orient, but they occur in great numbers in the Occident as well as in all the other civilized countries. The magician certainly has the opportunity – as long as he has not achieved the necessary maturity – of convincing himself of the existence of clairvoyance and other supernatural occurrences in one way or another, but usually – and that is the worst of it – he does not stop at this conviction; he too may become prey to intoxication and fall into the same condition as so many drug-stricken persons. For this reason I will not describe any method in this work that would tempt the magician to experiment on such things, but I shall only point out quite harmless methods that allow clairvoyance to occur automatically, in conformity with the spiritual maturity and as a concomitance of the higher initiation. Another kind of clairvoyance is the one that is caused by impairment or temporary loss of the eyes. Most of the books teaching clairvoyance recommend staring at an object, a magic mirror, a crystal ball, or at gems, and those are good methods, but they are not adequate for everybody. These expedients for the development of clairvoyance are useful only in the hands of a trained magician, but they must not call forth clairvoyance by stimulating the optic nerve. They are meant only to serve as a mere aid to an eye that already is trained consciously. From the magical point of view not a single dodge, however highly praised or scrupulously executed, is capable of producing the gift of clairvoyance. This capacity depends on the talents and on the psychical and astral development and maturity of the magician. Further chapters in which I shall teach how to make fluid condensers also will include instructions for the production of magic mirrors and other appliances. The magician ought not to forget that all the dodges and appliances mentioned here are nothing but poor expedients. By no means, however, are they the real factor that produces the desired result of genuine clairvoyance. Finally I will mention the latter kind of clairvoyance, which occurs as a concomitance of the correct magical development and which is caused through the systematic display of the clairvoyance eyes. I have resolved to quote in this book a secret magical method that has not been mentioned in any other work up to now, but which is exceedingly useful from the hermetic point of view as well as by analogy with the laws of the elements. The practice of the development of the astral senses follows below. Download 0.49 Mb. Share with your friends:
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