Monday, April 30, 2007

7 Ways to Dramatically Improve your Life

I read the other day that some sci-fi writer (don't remember who) wrote something like 400 books in life, a bunch of screenplays and some other crap. He said he was able to do this by starting every morning with writing a bunch of nonsense. He would just sit down and empty his head of all sorts of diarrhea. Then from this offal he would pick out some ideas and just go hard for the rest of the day. "Good idea" I thought. I had played with this technique on my own when I was a teen and it dramatically improved my creativity. I was never at a loss for something to write about and everything I wrote was some degree of decent. I revisited this concept a few times throughout the years but never consistently. Now I'm trying it again. I'm still deliberating whether or not to post the morning's nonsense so if you'd like to see it just leave a comment. The last post here is a short little example of that.

Also I was thinking of putting up this little thing where people can chat with me when I'm logged on. I thought I might have some weekly discussion topics or something like that. We could talk philosophy, religion, politics, art, pop culture, bullshit, whatever. Let me know what you think.

Now, I haven't been getting much feedback from you. You're just sitting there reading while I'm doing all the work.
That just won't do.
I'd like to hear from you. So put all your thoughts down and start posting them in the comments sections. I'll respond to every single one of them I promise.

This week I'm learning I whole bunch of really interesting stuff. I'm getting a deeper understanding of Wittgenstein's writings, I'm learning some stuff about Tantric and Taoist sexual practices (fun!), I brushing up on my Kabbalah, I'm learning set theory, and I'll be reading a couple self-help books. So I'll be posting some crap about all of these topics throughout the week and if there's anything in particular that you'd like my opinion on just let me know.

I didn't do a post yesterday and for that I'm sorry. I just always seem to have trouble doing any kind of work on Sundays. It must be all those years of being raised Christian. "don't work on Sundays or you'll offend the lord" and all that shit. I heard that a few times growing up, mostly from teachers in school. But I'll do better next time.

Today I want to leave you with a list of personal development tools. These are the ones that I've used consistently over the years and have proven to be infinitely useful.

1. PhotoReading. A great compliment to anyone's arsenal of weapons with which to take heaven by force. Combine this with Image Streaming and mind mapping and you've got yourself a first class brain in a few easy lessons.

2.Kettlebells. The single most difficult (and therefore most effective) workout tool know to modern science. Exercise is vitally important to every aspect of one's life, from mental and emotional health, to the development of will power and discipline, to the expansion of one's usable reserves of energy.

3.Yoga. Here I'm not talking about that crap that everyone does. All the poses and stretching are good for emotional stability and they can be a decent form of exercise but the Yoga I'm talking about goes so much further it's not even funny. For a good treatment of this type of yoga check out Crowley's "Eight Lectures on Yoga" on the left in the books list. Fantastic.

4.Liber Jugorum. This is actually a branch of yoga but it's not explicitly presented as such. Suffice it to say that this is probably the single most useful exercise for the development of mental control, introspection, awareness, and concentration. Don't be squeamish and make sure you follow the directions to the letter.

5.Magick. This can be summed up succinctly with one word: Love. For books check out Liber ABA, and Transcendental Magic. These two will give you the best introduction to the subject and will lead you to further resources (if you need them).

6.Qabbalah. This should probably go under the magick heading but it's got so many uses it's hard to classify. It's a great memory tool when used as a peg system or mnemonic device. It helps deepen one's understanding of just about every concept imaginable and it can be used for practical magick. An all around useful tool.

7.Language. Learn to speak well and persuasively and the whole world can open up for you. NLP is a great place to start with this.

There are others, many others, but these are the indispensable ones that I've found. If I had to recommend a starting place I'd say go for Photoreading first. Learning how to read at 60,000+ words per minute will literally change your entire life. From there it's up to you but probably the next best step would be Liber Jugorum. Great stuff.

I've found free online resources for all of these topics so if you'd like me to give you the links or to guide you through somethings or if you just want to talk about something you can either leave a comment, subscribe (on the left) and I'll email you a whole bunch of stuff, or you can wait for me to put up that little chat window I'm going to put up. I'm always here to help.

Just before eight aighem

This is my sanctuary, this hole in the electronic age of non reason. I'd rather be a hippie, all long haired and troubled about the bad acid. I tried it once, I kept sleeping on the hair. Hurts too much to care about. I'd like to have it easier, an Iraqi war is better. More sand than Nam. Better sand castles. Drier too. Could you pass the butter.

Saturday, April 28, 2007

The Harmony of the World.

What makes me think the world is harmonious? I see the world as a body. I see every element in the world as a cell within that body. This body desires health and optimal functioning just like any other body. It has mechanisms in place that provide self correction. It has a multitude of elements with individual functions that all rely heavily on each other.
I also compare the world to the internet sometimes. Consider what would happen to a website that serves no purpose, that doesn't further the general interests of the internet (considered as an organism. BTW the interest of the internet might be something like efficient information transfer or something like that). Such sites (I've ran across a few, usually trying to sell some crap) never get visitors. The life blood stops flowing towards it and it eventually dies.
The world is similar though sometimes it might be difficult to appreciate that since you're looking at it from within. It can be difficult to see the entirety of a room while standing inside it. You can only really appreciate it wholistically from an elevated perspective. But I can sometimes see the harmony of things even from where I'm standing. Sometimes.
I can see the sun that causes the grass to grow, the grass feeding the cows, the cows feeding us, us appreciating the sun.
I can see life in alternating cycles of living and death. Both complementing each other. Each one necessary for the other to exist.
I can see that when something (seemingly insignificant) is removed from the system (e.g. extinction) the whole system feels the effects.
I see the resolution of the "schizophrenic observer" paradox in quantum physics being resolved by the assumption of a single universal mind.
I see the singularity from which we came and to which we are returning. All in the same boat.
The world is a whole. At least the way I see it.

Easy Chess Scam

Friday, April 27, 2007

The Testament of Magdalen Blair.

Here's one of the best short stories I've ever read. It's by the great Aleister Crowley and originally appeared in The Equinox vol. 1 no. 9. I had to copy and paste it because the formating on the original is atrocious. This isn't much better but it'll do. Enjoy.


THE TESTAMENT OF MAGDALEN BLAIR
In my third term at Newnham I was already Professor Blair's favourite pupil. Later, he wasted a great deal of time praising my slight figure and my piquant face, with its big round grey eyes and their long black lashes; but the first attraction was my singular gift. Few men, and, I believe, no other women, could approach me in one of the most priceless qualifications for scientific study, the faculty of apprehending minute differences. My memory was poor, extraordinarily so; I had the utmost trouble to enter Cambridge at all. But I could adjust a micrometer better than either students or professor, and read a vernier with an accuracy to which none of them could even aspire. To this I added a faculty of subconscious calculation which was really uncanny. If I were engaged in keeping a solution between (say) 70 Degree and 80 Degrees I had no need to watch the thermometer. Automatically I became aware that the mercury was close to the limit, and would go over from my other work and adjust it without a thought. More remarkable still, if any object were placed on my {139} bench without my knowledge and then removed, I could, if asked within a few minutes, describe the object roughly, especially distinguishing the shape of its base and the degree of its opacity to heat and light. From these data I could make a pretty good guess at what the object was. This faculty of mine was repeatedly tested, and always with success.Extreme sensitiveness to minute degrees of heat was its obvious cause. I was also a singularly good thought-reader, even at this time. The other girls feared me absolutely. They need not have done so; I had neither ambition nor energy to make use of any of my powers. Even now, when I bring to mankind this message of a doom so appalling that at the age of twenty-four I am a shrivelled, blasted, withered wreck, I am supremely weary, supremely indifferent. I have the heart of a child and the consciousness of Satan, the lethargy of I know not what disease; and yet, thank --- oh! there can be no God! --- the resolution to warn mankind to follow my example, and then to explode a dynamite cartridge in my mouth. II In my third year at Newnham I spend four hours of every day at Professor Blair's house. All other work was neglected, gone through mechanically, if at all. This came about gradually, as the result of an accident. The chemical laboratory has two rooms, one small and capable of being darkened. On this occasion (the May term of my second year) this room was in use. It was {140} the first week of June, and extremely fine. The door was shut. Within was a girl, alone, experimenting with the galvanometer. I was absorbed in my own work. Quite without warning I looked up. "Quick!" said I, "Gladys is going to faint." Every one in the room stared at me. I took a dozen steps towards the door, when the fall of a heavy body sent the laboratory into hysterics. It was only the heat and confined atmosphere, and Gladys should not have come to work that day at all, but she was easily revived, and then the demonstrator acquiesced in the anarchy that followed. "How did she know?" was the universal query; for that I knew was evident. Ada Brown ("Athanasia contra mundum") pooh-poohed the whole affair; Margaret Letchmere thought I must have heard something, perhaps a cry inaudible to the others, owing to their occupied attention; Doris Leslie spoke of second sight, and Amy Gore of "Sympathy." All the theories, taken together, went round the clock of conjecture. Professor Blair came in at the most excited part of the discussion, calmed the room in two minutes, elicited the facts in five, and took me off to dine with him. "I believe it's this human thermopile affair of yours," he said. "Do you mind if we try a few parlour tricks after dinner?" His aunt, who kept house for him,protested in vain, and was appointed Grand Superintendent in Ordinary of my five senses. My hearing was first tested, and found normal, or thereabouts. I was then blindfolded, and the aunt (by excess of precaution) stationed between me and the Professor. I found that I could describe even small movements that he made, so {141} long as he was between me and the western window, not at all when he moved round to the other quarters. This is in conformity with the "Thermopile" theory; it was contradicted completely on other occasions. The results (in short) were very remarkable and very puzzling; we wasted two precious hours in futile theorizing. In the event the aunt (cowed by a formidable frown) invited me to spend the Long Vacation in Cornwall. During these months the Professor and I assiduously worked to discover exactly the nature and limit of my powers. The result, in a sense, was "nil." For one thing, these powers kept on "breaking out in a new place." I seemed to do all I did by perception of minute differences; but then it seemed as if I had all sorts of different apparatus. "One down, t'other come on," said Professor Blair. Those who have never made scientific experiments cannot conceive how numerous and subtle are the sources of error, even in the simplest matters. In so obscure and novel a field of research no result is trustworthy until it has been verified a thousand times. In our field we discovered no constants, all variables. Although we had hundreds of facts any one of which seemed capable of overthrowing all accepted theories of the means of communication between mind and mind, we had nothing, absolutely nothing, which we could use as the basis of a new theory. It is naturally impossible to give even an outline of the course of our research. Twenty-eight closely written notebooks referring to this first period are at the disposal of my executors. {142} III In the middle of the day, in my third year, my father was dangerously ill. I bicycled over to Peterborough at once, never thinking of my work. (My father is a canon of Peterborough Cathedral.) On the third day I received a telegram from Professor Blair, "Will you be my wife?" I had never realized myself as a woman, or him as a man, till that moment, and in that moment I knew that I loved him and had always loved him. It was a case of what one might call "Love at first absence." My father recovered rapidly; I returned to Cambridge; we were married during the May week, and went immediately to Switzerland. I beg to be spared any recital of so sacred a period of my life: but I must record one fact. We were sitting in a garden by Lago Maggiore after a delightful tramp from Chamounix over the Col du Geant to Courmayeur, and thence to Aosta, and so by degrees to Pallanza. Arthur rose, apparently struck by some idea, and began to walk up and down the terrace. "I was quite suddenly impelled to turn my head to assure myself of his presence." This may seem nothing to you who read, unless you have true imagination. But think of yourself talking to a friend in full light, and suddenly leaning forward to touch him. "Arthur!" I cried, "Arthur!" The distress in my tone brought him running to my side. "What is it, Magdalen?" he cried, anxiety in every word. I closed my eyes. "Make gestures!" said I. (He was directly between me and the sun.) He obeyed, wondering. {143} "You are ------ your are" ------ I stammered ------ "no! I don't know what you are doing. I am blind!" He sawed his arm up and down. Useless; I had become absolutely insensitive. We repeated a dozen experiments that night. All failed. We concealed our disappointment, and it did not cloud our love. The sympathy between us grew even subtler and stronger, but only as it grows between all men and women who love with their whole hearts, and love unselfishly. IV We returned to Cambridge in October, and Arthur threw himself vigorously into the new year's work. Then I fell ill, and the hope we had indulged was disappointed. Worse, the course of the illness revealed a condition which demanded the most complete series of operations which a woman can endure. Not only the past hope, but all future hope, was annihilated. It was during my convalescence that the most remarkable incident of my life took place. I was in great pain one afternoon, and wished to see the doctor. The nurse went to the study to telephone for him. "Nurse!" I said, as she returned, "don't lie to me. He's not gone to Royston; he's got cancer, and is too upset to come." "Whatever next?" said the nurse. "It's right he can't come, and I was going to tell you he had gone to Royston; but I never heard nothing about no cancer." This was true; she had not been told. But the next morning we heard that my "intuition" was correct. {144} As soon as I was well enough, we began our experiments again. My powers had returned, and in triple force. Arthur explained my "intuition" as follows: "The doctor (when you last saw him) did not know consciously that he had cancer; but subconsciously Nature gave warning. You read this subconsciously, and it sprang into your consciousness when you read on the nurse's face that he was ill." This, farfetched as it may seem, at least avoids the shallow theories about "telepathy." From this time my powers constantly increased. I could read my husband's thoughts from imperceptible movements of his face as easily as a trained deaf-mute can sometimes read the speech of a distant man from the movements of his lips. Gradually as we worked, day by day, I found my grasp of detail ever fuller. It is not only that I could read emotions; I could tell whether he was thinking 3465822 or 3456822. In the year following my illness we made 436 experiments of this kind, each extending over several hours; in all 9363, with only 122 failures, and these all, without exception, partial. The year following, our experiments were extended to a reading of his dreams. In this I proved equally successful. My practice was to leave the room before he woke, write down the dream that he had dreamt, and await him at the breakfast-table, where he would compare his record with mine. Invariably they were identical, with this exception, that my record was always much fuller than his. He would nearly always, however, purport to remember the details supplied by me; but this detail has (I think) no real scientific value. But what does it all matter, when I think of the horror impending? {145} V That my only means of discovering Arthur's thought was by muscle-reading became more than doubtful during the third year of our marriage. We practised "telepahty" unashamed. We excluded the "muscle-reader" and the "super-auditor" and the "human thermopile" by elaborate precautions; yet still I was able to read every thought of his mind. On our holiday in North Wales at Easter one year we separated for a week, at the end of that week he to be on the leeward, I on the windward side of Tryfan, at an appointed hour, he there to open and read to himself a sealed packet given him by "some stranger met at Pen-y-Pass during the week." The experiment was entirely successful; I reproduced every word of the document. If the "telepathy" is to be vitiated, it is on the theory that I had previously met the "stranger" and read from him what he would write in such circumstances! Surely direct communication of mind with mind is an easier theory! Had I known in what all this was to culminate, I suppose I should have gone mad. Thrice fortunate that I can warn humanity of what awaits each one. The greatest benefactor of his race will be he who discovers and explosive indefinitely swifter and more devastating than dynamite. If I could only trust myself to prepare Chloride of Nitrogen in sufficient quantity. ... VI Arthur became listless and indifferent. The perfection of love that had been our marriage failed without warning, and yet by imperceptible gradations. {146} My awakening to the fact was, however, altogether sudden. It was one summer evening; we were paddling on the Cam. One of Arthur's pupils, also in a Canadian canoe, challenged us to race. At Magdalen Bridge we were a length ahead --- suddenly I heard my husband's thought. It was the most hideous and horrible laugh that it is possible to conceive. No devil could laugh so. I screamed, and dropped my paddle. Both the men thought me ill. I assured myself that it was not the laugh of some townee on the bridge, distorted by my over-sensitive organization. I said no more; Arthur looked grave. At night he asked abruptly after a long period of brooding, "Was that my thought?" I could only stammer that I did not know. Incidentally he complained of fatigue, and the listlessness, which before had seemed nothing to me, assumed a ghastly shape. There was something in him that was not he! The indifference had appeared transitory; I now became aware of it as constant and increasing. I was at this time twenty-three years old. You wonder that I write with such serious attitude of mind. I sometimes think that I have never had any thoughts of my own; that I have always been reading the thoughts of another, or perhaps of Nature. I seem only to have been a woman in those first few months of marriage. VII The six months following held for me nothing out of the ordinary, save that six or seven times I had dreams, vivid and terrible. Arthur had no share in these; yet I knew, I cannot say how, that they were his dreams and not mine; or rather {147} that they were in his subconscious waking self, for one occurred in the afternoon, when he was out shooting, and not in the least asleep. The last of them occurred towards the end of the October term. He was lecturing as usual, I was at home, lethargic after a too heavy breakfast following a wakeful night. I saw suddenly a picture of the lecture-room, enormously greater than in reality, so that it filled all space; and in the rostrum, bulging over it in all directions, was a vast, deadly pale devil with a face which was a blasphemy on Arthur's. The evil joy of it was indescribable. So wan and bloated, its lips so loose and bloodless; fold after fold of its belly flopping over the rostrum and pushing the students out of the hall, it leered unspeakably. Then dribbled from its mouth these words: "Ladies and gentlemen, the course is finished. You may go home." I cannot hope even to suggest the wickedness and filth of these simple expressions. Then, raising its voice to a grating scream, it yelled: "White of egg! White of egg! White of egg!" again and again for twenty minutes. The effect on me was shocking. It was as if I had a vision of Hell. Arthur found me in a very hysterical condition, but soon soothed me. "Do you know," he said at dinner, "I believe I have got a devilish bad chill?" It was the first time I had known him to complain of his health. In six years he had not had as much as a headache. I told him my "dream" when we were in bed, and he seemed unusually grave, as if he understood where I had failed in its interpretation. In the morning he was feverish; I made him stay in bed and sent for the doctor. The same afternoon I {148} learnt that Arthur was seriously ill, had been ill, indeed, for months. The doctor called it Bright's disease. VIII I said "the last of the dreams." For the next year we travelled, and tried various treatments. My powers remained excellent, but I received none of the subconscious horrors. With few fluctuations, he grew steadily worse; daily he became more listless, more indifferent, more depressed. Our experiments were necessarily curtailed. Only one problem exercised him, the problem of his personality. He began to wonder "who he was." I do not mean that he suffered from delusions. I mean that the problem of the true Ego took hold of his imagination. One perfect summer night at Contrexeville he was feeling much better; the symptoms had (temporarily) disappeared almost entirely under the treatment of a very skilful doctor at that Spa, a Dr. Barbezieux, a most kind and thoughtful man. "I am going to try," said Arthur, "to penetrate myself. Am I an animal, and is the world without a purpose? Or am I a soul in a body? Or am I, one and indivisible in some incredible sense, a spark of the infinite light of God? I am going to think inwards: I shall possibly go into some form of trance, unintelligible to myself. You may be able to interpret it." The experiment had lasted about half an hour when he sat up gasping with effort. "I have seen nothing, heard nothing," I said. "Not one thought has passed from you to me." {149} But at that very moment what had been in his mind flashed into mine. "It is a blind abyss," I told him, "and there hangs in it a vulture vaster than the whole starry system." "Yes," he said, "that was it. But that was not all. I could not get beyond it. I shall try again." He tried. Again I was cut off from his thought, although his face was twitching so that one might have said that any one might read his mind. "I have been looking in the wrong place," said he suddenly, but very quietly and without moving. "The thing I want lies at the base of the spine." This time I saw. In a blue heaven was coiled an infinite snake of gold and green, with four eyes of fire, black fire and red, that darted rays in every direction; held within its coils was a great multitude of laughing children. And even as I looked, all this was blotted out. Crawling rivers of blood spread over the heaven, of blood purulent with nameless forms --- mangy dogs with their bowels dragging behind them; creatures half elephant, half beetle; things that were but a ghastly bloodshot eye, set about with leathery tentacles; women whose skins heaved and bubbled like boiling sulphur, giving off clouds that condensed into a thousand other shapes, more hideous than their mother; these were the least of the denizens of these hateful rivers. The most were things impossible to name or to describe. I was brought back from the vision by the stertorous and strangling breath of Arthur, who had been seized with a convulsion. From this he never really rallied. The dim sight grew {150} dimmer, the speech slower and thicker, the headaches more persistent and acute. Torpor succeeded to his old splendid energy and activity; his days became continual lethargy ever deepening towards coma. Convulsions now and then alarmed me for his immediate danger. Sometimes his breath came hard and hissing like a snake in anger; towards the end it assumed the Cheyne-Stokes type in bursts of ever-increasing duration and severity. In all this, however, he was still himself; the horror that was and yet was not himself did not peer from behind the veil "So long as I am consciously myself," he said in one of his rare fits of brightness, "I can communicate to you what I am consciously thinking; as soon as this conscious ego is absorbed, you get the subconscious thought which I fear --- oh how I fear! --- is the greater and truer part of me. You have brought unguessed explanations from the world of sleep; you are the one woman in the world --- perhaps there may never be another --- who has such an opportunity to study the phenomena of death." He charged me earnestly to suppress my grief, to concentrate wholly on the thoughts that passed through his mind when he could no longer express them, and also on those of his subconsciousness when coma inhibited consciousness. It is this experiment that I now force myself to narrate. The prologue has been long; it has been necessary to put the facts before mankind in a simple way so that they may seize the opportunity of the proper kind of suicide. I beg my readers most earnestly not to doubt my statements: the notes {151} of our experiments, left in my will to the greatest thinker now living, Professor von Buhle, will make clear the truth of my relation, and the great and terrible necessity of immediate, drastic, action. Part II I THE stunning physical fact of my husband's illness was the immense prostration. So strong a body, as too often the convulsions gave proof; such inertia with it! He would lie all day like a log; then without warning or apparent cause the convulsions would begin. Arthur's steady scientific brain stood it well; it was only two days before his death that delirium began. I was not with him; worn out as I was, and yet utterly unable to sleep, the doctor had insisted on my taking a long motor drive. In the fresh air I slumbered. I awoke to hear an unfamiliar voice saying in my ear, "Now for the fun of the fair!" There was no one there. Quick on its heels followed my husband's voice as I had long since known and loved it, clear, strong, resonant, measured: "Get this down right; it is very important. I am passing into the power of the subconsciousness. I may not be able to speak to you again. But I am here; I am not to be touched by all that I may suffer; I can always think; you can always read my ------" The voice broke off sharply to inquire, "But will it ever end?" as if some one had spoken to it. And then I heard the laugh. The laugh that I had heard by Magdalen Bridge was heavenly music beside that! The face of Calvin (even) as {152} he gloated over the burning of Servetus would have turned pitiful had he heard it, so perfectly did it express quintessence of damnation. Now then my husband's thought seemed to have changed places with the other. It was below, within, withdrawn. I said to myself, "He is dead!" Then came Arthur's thought, "I had better pretend to be mad. It will save her, perhaps; and it will be a change. I shall pretend I have killed her with an axe. Damn it! I hope she is not listening>" I was now thoroughly awake, and told the drive to get home quickly. "I hope she is killed in the motor; I hope she is smashed into a million pieces. O God! hear my one prayer! let an Anarchist throw a bomb and smash Magdalen into a million pieces! especially the brain! and the brain first. O God! my first and last prayer: smash Magdalen into a million pieces!" The horror of this thought was my conviction --- then and now --- that it represented perfect sanity and coherence of thought. For I dreaded utterly to think what such words might imply. At the door of the sick-room I was met by the male nurse, who asked me not to enter. Uncontrollably, I asked, "Is he dead?" and though Arthur lay absolutely senseless on the bed I read the answering thought "Dead!" silently pronounced in such tones of mockery, horror, cynicism and despair as I never thought to hear. There was a something or somebody who suffered infinitely, and yet who gloated infinitely upon that very suffering. And that something was a veil between me and Arthur. The hissing breath recommenced; Arthur seem to be {153} trying to express himself --- the self I knew. He managed to articulate feebly, "Is that the police? Let me get out of the house! The police are coming for me. I killed Magdalen with an axe." The symptoms of delirium began to appear. "I killed Magdalen" he muttered a dozen times, than changing to "Magdalen with" again and again; the voice low, slow, thick, yet reiterated. Then suddenly, quite clear and loud, attempting to rise in the bed: "I smashed Magdalen into a million pieces with an axe." After a moment's pause: "a million is not very many now-a-days." From this --- which I now see to have been the speech of a sane Arthur --- he dropped again into delirium. "A million pieces," "a cool million," "a million million million million million million" and so on: then abruptly: "Fanny's dog's dead." I cannot explain the last sentence to my readers; I may, however, remark that it meant everything to me. I burst into tears. At that moment I caught Arthur's thought, "You ought to be busy with the note-book, not crying." I resolutely dried my eyes, took courage, and began to write. II The doctor came in at this moment and begged me to go and rest. "You are only distressing yourself, Mrs. Blair," he said; "and needlessly, for he is absolutely unconscious and suffers nothing." A pause. "My God! why do you look at me like that?" he exclaimed, frightened out of his wits. I think my face had caught something of that devil's, something of that sneer, that loathing, that mire of contempt and stark despair. {154} I sank back into myself, ashamed already that mere knowledge --- and such mean vile knowledge --- should so puff one up with hideous pride. No wonder Satan fell! I began to understand all the old legends, and far more ------ I told Doctor Kershaw that I was carrying out Arthur's last wishes. He raised no further opposition; but I saw him sign to the male nurse to keep an eye on me. The sick man's finger beckoned us. He could not speak; he traced circles on the counterpane. The doctor (with characteristic intelligence) having counted the circles, nodded; and said: "Yes, it is nearly seven o'clock. Time for your medicine, eh?" "No," I explained, "he means that he is in the seventh circle of Dante's Hell." At that instant he entered on a period of noisy delirium. Wild and prolonged howls burst from his throat; he was being chewed unceasingly by "Dis"; each howl signalled the meeting of the monster's teeth. I explained this to the doctor. "No," said he, "he is perfectly unconscious." "Well," said I, "he will howl about eighty times more. Doctor Kershaw looked at me curiously, but began to count. My calculation was correct. He turned to me, "Are you a woman?" "No," said I, "I am my husband's colleague." "I think it is suggestion. You have hypnotized him?" "Never: but I can read his thoughts." "Yes, I remember now; I read a very remarkable paper in "Mind" two years ago." "That was child's play. But let me go on with my work." {155} He gave some final instructions to the nurse, and went out. The suffering of Arthur was at this time unspeakable. Chewed as he was into mere pulp that passed over the tongue of "Dis," each bleeding fragment kept its own identity and his. The papillae of the tongue were serpents, and each one gnashed its poisoned teeth upon that fodder. And yet, though the sensorium of Arthur was absolutely unimpaired, indeed hyperaesthetic, his consciousness of pain seemed to depend upon the opening of the mouth. As it closed in mastication, oblivion fell upon him like a thunderbolt. A merciful oblivion? Oh! what a master stroke of cruelty! Again and again he woke from nothing to a hell of agony, of pure ecstasy of agony, until he understood that this would continue for all his life; the alternation was but systole and diastole, the throb of his envenomed pulse, the reflection in consciousness of his blood-beat. I became conscious of his intense longing for death to end the torture. The blood circulated ever slower and more painfully; I could feel him hoping for the end. This dreadful rose-dawn suddenly greyed and sickened with doubt. Hope sank to its nadir; fear rose like a dragon, with leaden wings. Suppose, thought he, that after all death does not end me! I cannot express this conception. It is not that the heart sank, it had nowhither to sink; it knew itself immortal, and immortal in a realm of unimagined pain and terror, unlighted by one glimpse of any other light than that pale glare of hate and of pestilence. This thought took shape in these words: I AM THAT I AM. {156} One cannot say that the blasphemy added to the horror; rather it was the essence of the horror. It was the gnashing of the teeth of a damned soul. III The demon-shape, which I now clearly recognized as that which had figured in my last "dream" at Cambridge, seemed to gulp. At that instant a convulsion shook the dying man and a coughing eructation took the "demon." Instantly the whole theory dawned on me, that this "demon" was an imaginary personification of the disease. Now at once I understood demonology, from Bodin and Weirus to the moderns, without a flaw. But was it imaginary or was it real? Real enough to swallow up the "sane" thought! At that instant the old Arthur reappeared. "I am not the monster! I am Arthur Blair, of Fettes and Trinity. I have passed through a paroxysm." The sick man stirred feebly. A portion of his brain had shaken off the poison for the moment, and was working furiously against time. "I am going to die. "The consolation of death is Religion. "There is no use for Religion in life. "How many atheists have I not known sign the articles the sake of fellowships and livings! Religion in life is either an amusement and a soporific or a sham and a swindle. "I was brought up a Presbyterian "How easily I drifted into the English Church! {157} "And now where is God? "Where is the Lamb of God? "Where is the Saviour? "Where is the Comforter? "Why was I not saved from that devil? "Is he going to eat me again? To absorb me into him? O fate inconceivably hideous! It is quite clear to me --- I hope you've got it down, Magdalen! --- that the demon is made of all those that have died of Bright's disease. There must be different ones for each disease. I thought I once caught sight of a coughing bog of bloody slime. "Let me pray." A frenzied appeal to the Creator followed. Sincere as it was, it would read like irreverence in print. And then there came the cold-drawn horror of stark blasphemy against this God --- who would not answer. Followed the bleak black agony of the conviction --- the absolute certitude --- "There is no God!" combined with a wave of frenzied wrath against the people who had so glibly assured him that there was, an almost maniac hope that they would suffer more than he, if it were possible. (Poor Arthur! He had not yet brushed the bloom off Suffering's grape; he was to drink its fiercest distillation to the dregs.) "No!" thought he, "perhaps I lack their 'faith.' "Perhaps if I could really persuade myself of God and Christ ------ Perhaps if I could deceive myself, could make believe ------" Such a thought is to surrender one's honesty, to abdicate one's reason. It marked the final futile struggle of his will. {158} The demon caught and crunched him, and the noisy delirium began anew. My flesh and blood rebelled. Taken with a deathly vomit, I rushed from the room, and resolutely, for a whole hour, diverted my sensorium from thought. I had always found that the slightest trace of tobacco smoke in a room greatly disturbed my power. On this occasion I puffed cigarette after cigarette with excellent effect. I knew nothing of what had been going on. IV Arthur, stung by the venomous chyle, was tossing in that vast arched belly, which resembled the dome of hell, churned in its bubbling slime. I felt that he was not only disintegrated mechanically, but chemically, that his being was loosened more and more into its parts, that these were being absorbed into new and hateful things, but that (worst of all) Arthur stood immune from all, behind it, unimpaired, memory and reason ever more acute as ever new and ghastlier experience informed them. It seemed to me as if some mystic state were super-added to the torment; for while he was not, emphatically not, this tortured mass of consciousness, yet that was he. There are always at least two of us! The one who feels and the one who knows are not radically one person. This double personality is enormously accentuated at death. Another point was that the time-sense, which with men is usually so reliable --- especially in my own case --- was decidedly deranged, if not abrogated altogether. We all judge of the lapse of time in relation to our daily {159} habits or some similar standard. The conviction of immortality must naturally destroy all values for this sense. If I am immortal, what is the difference between a long time and a short time? A thousand years and a day are obviously the same thing from the point of view of "for ever." There is a subconscious clock in us, a clock wound up by the experience of the race to go for seventy years or so. Five minutes is a very long time to us if we are waiting for an omnibus, an age if we are waiting for a lover, nothing at all if we are pleasantly engaged or sleeping.<> We think of seven years as a long time in connection with penal servitude; as a negligibly small period in dealing with geology. But, given immortality, the age of the stellar system itself is nothing. This conviction had not fully impregnated the consciousness of Arthur; it hung over him like a threat, while the intensification of that consciousness, its liberation from the sense of time natural to life, caused each act of the demon to appear of vast duration, although the intervals between the howls of the body on the bed were very short. Each pang of torture or suspense was born, rose to its crest, and died to be reborn again through what seemed countless aeons. Still more was this the case in the process of his assimilation {160} by the "demon." The coma of the dying man was a phenomenon altogether out of Time. The conditions of "digestion" were new to Arthur, he had no reason to suppose, no data from which to calculate the distance of, an end. It is impossible to do more than sketch this process; as he was absorbed, so did his consciousness expand into that of the "demon"; he became one with all its hunger and corruption. Yet always did he suffer as himself in his own person the tearing asunder of his finest molecules; and this was confirmed by a most filthy humiliation of that part of him that was rejected. I shall not attempt to describe the final process; suffice it that the demoniac consciousness drew away; he was but the excrement of the demon, and as that excrement he was flung filthily further into the abyss of blackness and of night whose name is death. I rose with ashen cheeks. I stammered: "He is dead." The male nurse bent over the body. "Yes!" he echoed, "he is dead." And it seemed as if the whole Universe gathered itself into one ghastly laugh of hate and horror, "Dead!" V I resumed my seat. I felt that I must know that all was well, that death had ended all. Woe to humanity! The consciousness of Arthur was more alive than ever. It was the black fear of falling, a dumb ecstasy of changeless fear. There were no waves upon that sea of shame, no troubling of those accursed waters by any thought. There was no hope of any {161} ground to that abyss, no thought that it might stop. So tireless was that fall that even acceleration was absent; it was constant and level as the fall of a star. There was not even a feeling of pace; infinitely fast as it must be, judging from the peculiar dread which it inspired, it was yet infinitely slow, having regard to the infinitude of the abyss. I took measures not to be disturbed by the duties that men --- oh how foolishly! --- pay to the dead: and I took refuge in a cigarette. It was now for the first time, strangely enough, that I began to consider the possibility of helping him. I analysed the position. It must be his thought, or I could not read it. I had no reason to conjecture that any other thoughts could reach me. He must be alive in the true sense of the word; it was he and not another that was the prey of this fear ineffable. Of this fear it was evident that there must be a physical basis in the constitution of his brain and body. All the other phenomena had been shown to correspond exactly with a physical condition; it was the reflection in a consciousness from which human limitation had fallen away of things actually taking place in the body. It was a false interpretation perhaps; but it was his interpretation; and it was that which caused suffering so beyond all that poets have ever dreamt of the infernal. I am ashamed to say that my first thought was of the Catholic Church and its masses for the repose of the dead. I went to the Cathedral, revolving as I went all that had ever been said --- the superstitions of a hundred savage tribes. At bottom I could find no difference between their barbarous rites and those of Christianity. {162} However that might be, I was baffled. The priests refused to pray for the soul of a heretic. I hurried back to the house, resumed my vigil. There was no change, except a deepening of the fear, an intensification of the loneliness, a more utter absorption in the shame. I could but hope that in the ultimate stagnation of all vital forces, death would become final, hell merged into annihilation. This started a train of thought which ended in a determination to hasten the process. I thought of blowing out the brains, remembered that I had no means of doing so. I thought of freezing the body, imagined a story for the nurse, reflected that no cold could excite in his soul aught icier than that illimitable void of black. I thought of telling the doctor that he had wished to bequeath his body to the surgeons, that he had been afraid of being buried alive, anything that might induce him to remove the brain. At that moment I looked into the mirror, I saw that I must not speak. My hair was white, my face drawn, my eyes wild and bloodshot. In utter helplessness and misery I flung myself on the couch in the study, and puffed greedily at cigarettes. The relief was so immense that my sense of loyalty and duty had a hard fight to get me to resume the task. The mingling of horror, curiosity, and excitement must have aided. I threw away my fifth cigarette, and returned to the death chamber. VI Before I had sat at the table ten minutes a change burst out with startling suddenness. At one point in the void the {163} blackness gathered, concentrated, sprang into an evil flame that gushed aimlessly forth from nowhere to nowhere. This was accompanied by the most noxious stench. It was gone before I could realize it. As lightning precedes thunder, it was followed by a hideous clamour that I can only describe as the cry of a machine in pain. This recurred constantly for an hour and five minutes, then ceased as suddenly as it began. Arthur still fell. It was succeeded after the lapse of five hours by another paroxysm of the same kind, but fiercer and more continuous. Another silence followed, age upon age of fear and loneliness and shame. About midnight there appeared a grey ocean of bowels below the falling soul. This ocean seemed to be limitless. It fell headlong into it, and the splash awakened it to a new consciousness of things. This sea, though infinitely cold, was boiling like tubercles. Itself a more or less homogeneous slime, the stench of which is beyond all human conception (human language is singularly deficient in words that describe smell and taste; we always refer our sensations to things generally known)<> it constantly budded into greenish boils with angry red craters, whose {164} jagged edges were of a livid white; and from these issued pus formed of all things known of man --- each one distorted, degraded, blasphemed. Things innocent, things happy, things holy! every one unspeakably defiled, loathsome, sickening! During the vigil of the day following I recognized one group. I saw Italy. First the Italy of the map, a booted leg. But this leg changed rapidly through myriad phases. It was in turn the leg of every beast and bird, and in every case each leg was suffering with all diseases from leprosy and elephantiasis to scrofula and syphilis. There was also the consciousness that this was inalienably and for ever part of Arthur. Then Italy itself, in every detail foul. Then I myself, seen as every woman that has ever been, each one with every disease and torture that Nature and man have plotted in their hellish brains, each ended with a death, a death like Arthur's, whose infinite pangs were added to his own, recognized and accepted as his own. The same with our child that never was. All children of all nations, incredibly aborted, deformed, tortured, torn in pieces, abused by every foulness that the imagination of an arch-devil could devise. And so for every thought. I realized that the putrefactive changes in the dead man's brain were setting in motion every memory of his, and smearing them with hell's own paint. I timed one thought: despite its myriad million details, each one clear, vivid and prolonged, it occupied but three seconds of earthly time. I considered the incalculable array of the thoughts in his {165} well-furnished mind; I saw that thousands of year would not exhaust them. But, perhaps, when the brain was destroyed beyond recognition of its component parts ------ We have always casually assumed that consciousness depends upon a proper flow of blood in the vessels of the brain; we have never stopped to think whether the records might not be excited in some other manner. And yet we know how tumour of the brain begets hallucinations. Consciousness works strangely; the least disturbance of the blood supply, and it goes out like a candle, or else takes monstrous forms. Here was the overwhelming truth; "in death man lives again, and lives for ever." Yet we might have thought of it; the phantasmagoria of life which throng the mind of a drowning man might have suggested something of the sort to any man with a sympathetic and active imagination. Worse even than the thoughts themselves was the apprehension of the thoughts ere they arose. Carbuncles, boils, ulcers, cancers, there is no equivalent for these pustules of the bowels of hell, into whose seething convolutions Arthur sank deeper, ever deeper. The magnitude of this experience is not to be apprehended by the human mind as we know it. I was convinced that an end must come, for me, with the cremation of the body. I was infinitely glad that he had directed this to be done. But for him, end and beginning seemed to have no meaning. Through it all I seemed to hear the real Arthur's thought. "Though all this is I, yet it is only an accident of me; I stand behind it all, immune, eternal." {166} It must not be supposed that this in any way detracted from the intensity of the suffering. Rather it added to it. To be loathsome is less than to be linked to loathsomeness. To plunge into impurity is to become deadened to disgust. But to do so and yet to remain pure --- every vileness adds a pang. Think of Madonna imprisoned in the body of a prostitute, and compelled to acknowledge "This is I," while never losing her abhorrence. Not only immured in hell, but compelled to partake of its sacraments; not only high priest at its agapae, but begetter and manifestor of its cult; a Christ nauseated at the kiss of Judas, and yet aware that the treachery was his own. VII As the putrefaction of the brain advanced, the bursting of the pustules occasionally overlapped, with the result that the confusion and exaggeration of madness with all its poignancy was superadded to the the simpler hell. One might have thought that any confusion would have been a welcome relief to a lucidity so appalling; but this was not so. The torture was infused with a shattering sense of alarm. The images rose up threatening, disappeared only by blasting themselves into the pultaceous coprolite which was, as it were, the main body of the army which composed Arthur. Deeper and deeper as he dropped the phenomena grew constantly in every sense. Now they were a jungle in which the obscurity and terror of the whole gradually overshadowed even the abhorrence due to every part. The madness of the living is a thing so abominable and {167} fearful as to chill every human heart with horror; it is less than nothing in comparison with the madness of the dead! A further complication now arose in the destruction irrevocable and complete of that compensating mechanism of the brain, which is the basis of the sense of time. Hideously distorted and deformed as it had been in the derangement of the brain, like a shapeless jelly shooting out, of a sudden, vast, unsuspected tentacles, the destruction of it cut a thousandfold deeper. The sense of consecution itself was destroyed; things sequent appeared as things superposed or concurrent spatially; a new dimension unfolded; a new destruction of all limitation exposed a new and unfathomable abyss. To all the rest was added the bewilderment and fear which earthly agaraphobia faintly shadows forth; and at the same time the close immurement weighed upon him, since from infinitude there can be no escape. Add to this the hopelessness of the monotony of the situation. Infinitely as the phenomena were varied, they were yet recognized as essentially the same. All human tasks are lightened by the certainty that they must end. Even our joys would be intolerable were we convinced that they must endure, through irksomeness and disgust, through weariness and satiety, even for ever and for evermore. In this inhuman, this praeterdiabolic inferno was a wearisome repetition, a harping on the same hateful discord, a continuous nagging whose intervals afforded no relief, only a suspense brimming with the anticipation of some fresh terror. For hours which were to him eternities this stage continued as each cell that held the record of a memory underwent the degenerative changes which awoke it into hyperbromic purulence. {168} VIII The minute bacterial corruption now assumed a gross chemistry. The gases of putrefaction forming in the brain and interpenetrating it were represented in his consciousness by the denizens of the pustules becoming formless and impersonal --- Arthur had not yet fathomed the abyss. Creeping, winding, embracing, the Universe enfolded him, violated him with a nameless and intimate contamination, involved his being in a more suffocating terror. Now and again it drowned that consciousness in a gulf which his thought could not express to me; and indeed the first and least of his torments is utterly beyond human expression. It was a woe ever expanded, ever intensified, by each vial of wrath. Memory increased, and understanding grew; the imagination had equally got rid of limit. What this means who can tell? The human mind cannot really appreciate numbers beyond a score or so; it can deal with numbers by ratiocination, it cannot apprehend them by direct impression. It requires a highly trained intelligence to distinguish between fifteen and sixteen matches on a plate without counting them. In death this limitation is entirely removed. Of the infinite content of the Universe every item was separately realized. The brain of Arthur had become equal in power to that attributed by theologians to the Creator; yet of executive power there was no seed. The impotence of man before circumstance was in him magnified indefinitely, yet without loss of detail or of mass. He understood that The Many was The One without losing or fusing {169} the conception of either. He was God, but a God irretrievably damned: a being infinite, yet limited by the nature of things, and that nature solely compact of loathliness. IX I have little doubt that the cremation of my husband's body cut short a process which in the normally buried man continues until no trace of organic substance remains. The first kiss of the furnace awoke an activity so violent and so vivid that all the past paled in its lurid light. The quenchless agony of the pang is not to be described; if alleviation there were, it was but the exultation of feeling that this was final. Not only time, but all expansions of time, all monsters of time's womb were to be annihilated; even the ego might hope some end. The ego is the "worm that dieth not," and existence the "fire that is not quenched." Yet in this universal pyre, in this barathrum of liquid lava, jetted from the volcanoes of the infinite, this "lake of fire that is reserved for the devil and his angels," might not one at last touch bottom? Ah! but time was no more, neither any eidolon thereof! The shell was consumed; the gases of the body, combined and recombined, flamed off, free from organic form. Where was Arthur? His brain, his individuality, his life, were utterly destroyed. As separate things, yes: Arthur had entered the universal consciousness. And I heard this utterance: or rather this is my translation {170} into English of a single thought whose synthesis is "Woe." Substance is called spirit or matter. Spirit and matter are one, indivisible, eternal, indestructible. Infinite and eternal change! Infinite and eternal pain! No absolute: no truth, no beauty, no idea, nothing but the whirlwinds of form, unresting, unappeasable. Eternal hunger! Eternal war! Change and pain infinite and unceasing. There is no individuality but in illusion. And the illusion is change and pain, and its destruction is change and pain, and its new segregation from the infinite and eternal is change and pain; and substance infinite and eternal is change and pain unspeakable. Beyond thought, which is change and pain, lies being, which is change and pain. These were the last words intelligible; they lapsed into the eternal moan, Woe! Woe! Woe! Woe! Woe! Woe! Woe! in unceasing monotony that rings always in my ears if I let my thought fall from the height of activity, listen to the voice of my sensorium. In my sleep I am partially protected, and I keep a lamp constantly alight to burn tobacco in the room: but yet too often my dreams throb with that reiterated Woe! Woe! Woe! Woe! Woe! Woe! Woe! X The final stage is clearly enough inevitable, unless we believe the Buddhist theories, which I am somewhat inclined {171} to do, as their theory of the Universe is precisely confirmed in every detail by the facts here set down. But it is one thing to recognize a disease, another to discover a remedy. Frankly, my whole being revolts from their methods, and I had rather acquiesce in the ultimate destiny and achieve it as quickly as may be. My earnest preoccupation is to avoid the preliminary tortures, and I am convinced that the explosion of a dynamite cartridge in the mouth is the most practicable method of effecting this. There is just the possibility that if all thinking minds, all "spiritual beings," were thus destroyed, and especially if all organic life could be annihilated, that the Universe might cease to be, since (as Bishop Berkeley has shown) it can only exist in some thinking mind. And there is really no evidence (in spite of Berkeley) for the existence of any extra-human consciousness. Matter in itself may think, in a sense, but its monotony of woe is less awful than its abomination, the building up of high and holy things only to drag them through infamy and terror to the old abyss. I shall consequently cause this record to be widely distributed. The note-books of my work with Arthur (Vols, I-CCXIV) will be edited by Professor von Buehle, whose marvellous mind may perhaps discover some escape from the destiny which menaces mankind. Everything is in order in these note-books; and I am free to die, for I can endure no more, and above all things I dread the onset of illness, and the possibility of natural or accidental death. {172} NOTE I am glad to have the opportunity of publishing, in a journal so widely read by the profession, the MS. of the widow of the late Professor Blair. Her mind undoubtedly became unhinged through grief at her husband's death; the medical man who attended him in his last illness grew alarmed at her condition, and had her watched. She tried (fruitlessly) to purchase dynamite at several shops, but on her going to the laboratory of her late husband, and attempting to manufacture Chloride of Nitrogen, obviously for the purpose of suicide, she was seized, certified insane, and placed in my care. The case is most unusual in several respects. (1) I have never known her inaccurate in any statement of veritable fact. (2) She can undoubtedly read thoughts in an astonishing manner. In particular, she is actually useful to me by her ability to foretell attacks of acute insanity in my patients. Some hours before they occur she can predict them to a minute. On an early occasion my disbelief in her power led to the dangerous wounding of one of my attendants. (3) She combines a fixed determination of suicide (in the extraordinary manner described by her) with an intense fear of death. She smokes uninterruptedly, and I am obliged to allow her to fumigate her room at night with the same drug. (4) She is certainly only twenty-four years old, and any competent judge would with equal certainty declare her sixty. (5) Professor von Buehle, to whom the note-books were {173} sent, addressed to me a long and urgent telegram, begging her release on condition that she would promise not to commit suicide, but go to work with him in Bonn. I have yet to learn, however, that German professors, however eminent, have any voice in the management of a private asylum in England, and I am certain that the Lunacy Commissioners will uphold me in my refusal to consider the question. It will then be clearly understood that this document is published with all reserve as the lucubration of a very peculiar, perhaps unique, type of insanity. V. ENGLISH, M.D. {174}

Some More High School Poetry

Here's another poem that I wrote in high school. I was just playing with the rhythm in this one so the plot is a bit off. I like it anyway though. If you love it don't be afraid to show your affection. Take it harder on me though I was only a child when I wrote it.


To the death of a friend.

As I ponder weak and weary,
On a summer day most dreary,
A solemn jest that’s felt before
Has come to take a soul for more.

It comes to life and sits there waiting.
Sits there silently debating.
Ponders what for death may hide
For he who stalks and demons ride.

The master purpose of his hiding
Is contained while sit he chiding,
Chiding as some dog of reason
Pounding on one’s darkest door.

Then to answer such a calling
The waiting demon sits for mauling,
Waits to maul the scared and breathless
While his blood lay on the floor.
Then as blood flows out, and dripping
The demon sits there, gripping, ripping,
Sits there feasting ever grinning
Grinning at the human gore.

A knock, what ho! Approaching foot steps.
Feet methinks of men with purpose?
Purpose then and backed with hatred
Hatred for the human gore.

Crashing, my, a knock intrusive.
I flee in fright, hide, most elusive.
Hiding from the guns of men with
A fear of death and nothing more.

“A slaughter” says one.

“A death from some dark vile demon,
Dark as night and dumb as reason.
Has come from some depraved nightmare,
So thoughts of his shall we implore.

“Seek out reason through the madness,
Madness never seen before”.
But they shan’t for all that madness
Has bled itself upon the floor.

Has bled itself a pool of question,
Questions n’er asked before.
Questions ere this time of demons
Have let the minds of men explore.

Then as the laughing demon leaps he
Lands upon the men with glee,
Then dancing on their minds and guns they
Fall in laughter to the floor.

They lay there dancing, singing, smiling.
Lay there knowing, happy, waiting,
As the demon looms above them
And they join the human gore.

Johnny's Meal

Johnny was a good boy
Johnny was a saint
Johnny had a craving
So ate a quart of paint.

He loved the lovely color
He watched it paint his tongue
But still he had a craving
So downed a heap a dung.

To all the Perverts of Restriction with Guilty Consciences.

How do you teach a child to be free of sexual fixations? It scares me to think that there are kids (even today) that will grow up with a fear of sex. It's disgusting to think that the little children won't be able to love because their parents are ignorant bigots too affraid to question what their parents told them to bring their children into a world of unconditional love, joy and ecstasy. Let's teach them to fear their own bodies and the bodies of others lest, for sure, their freedom and right knowledge should lead them to do something as foolish as sex! oohh shit some parts of flesh are reflecting the light of the sun and being received by the optic nerves of a small child! dear god what have we done?! They'll be marred for life because they have an accurate representation of what mommy and daddy do in the bedroom. I'll see you in hell I guess.

How can we bring our children up to be free to express the most recognizable manifestation of their wills in a safe and healthy way? Sexuality is the birthright of every child. She is born into the world with this amazing mechanism, this spiritual generator but no one is willing to show her how to use it because someone might accidentally see her vagina. That's dirty don't you know. Vaginas should always be hidden lest the secret of the oystered pearl be defiled by the plume sausage of the boy next door. Ohh GOD! Anything but that for my little girl! Best to forget about it and go fuck her mother.... better.

It's absurd to think a child should know about sex! She don't need to know no things like that! She's only a child! Life ain't available to her till she's eighty years old at least. An I aim to keeps it that way!

Life is love my friends.
Love is physical.
Purely.
No child should be afraid of life.
Respect and admiration friends.
Love is the law, love under will.

Thursday, April 26, 2007

Religion or Philosophy?

I was just reading a book by Michael Dummett (truth and other enigmas) and I realized something thats somewhat interesting. I've found that whenever I read philosophical books I get a certain level of comprehension of the topics I'm reading about. Often I read such books (the first time) with the intention of finding out how the author perceives reality. I usually leave disapointed. Like just now I got insights into all sorts of topics from Dummett's book like on the concepts of meaning, of an empirical logic, truth, functions, Wittgenstein's language games, etc. But I really couldn't tell you anything new about reality or Truth (capital T). With religious texts however, I always walk away with a sense of having gotten a glimpse of what lies beyond the veil. Perhaps this is due to the fact that a religious person is not (usually) focused on anything trivial. Essentially they are continually wrapped up in thoughts of infinity, unconditional love, and singularity whereas a philosopher is usually concerned with topics like truth, logical structure, teaching classes, writing books, meaning, and Wittgenstein.

Fear

Whats so great about being afraid? It's not like we get paid for it. Its not like we get some sort of prize at the end of a hard lonely night, crouched underneath a behemoth of a man, one with a knife. He's about to do something foolish. I can feel it. He feels it too. Makes him all the more unpredictable. Can he really see me? Does he feel me. Does he sense the fear in the pits of my chest and the sweat in the curves of my eyes?
Am I still alive? Do I still hear you? Am I fearful without my body? do I have a heart without the sense of beating? Am I still here?
Whats left when it's all taken? Do I have some sort of quidditas? Do I matter when the lights are out? Do you? Do we stabilize without observers or are the observers the only ones that keep us phrenic?
This man again. Who does he think he is? What brought him here? does it matter more than what brought me here? i doubt it, death is pretty important.
It keeps us in the world, feeds the life of Adam.
This Kadmon business is tiring. I get tired everyday around 11 at night, sometimes earlier. sometimes later. This keeps me happy most of the time.
I'm neither alone nor lonely, only the lost can see that though.
It's so much easier to be free when life is all about the pussy.
It's so much furrier to be about the life when death is all around us.
War.
Keep up the good work. It's been a while since I've seen the end of the world acted out before us. Keep in mind I'm only 12, just like my lord.
Hua allahu alazi, lailaha illa hua.
Whatever man, Arabs still scare me, maybe another hijacker! who knows. I'd rather be hateful than sorry.
It's all a matter of opinion. I've been cherishing that thought for years and upon inspection I've found it to be wanting, both in substance and form.
Would you please pass the salt, I can't live without it. Hurts too much.
Could you please do me better?
I could live without it but I like the way it feels.
Sense me?
Sense you!!
keep it to yourself!
I've had enough. I'm building a boat and drowning the rest. Keep me raised up above the level I need to be and I'm sure I'll find my way.
Raise it good you stupid fuck!
keep me quietly devoured in a shelter for the homeless, rapt up in little beds of ambient flowers and the scent of young girls. They scare me less now that I've been to prison.
I could stab people in the eyes, not in the back though, too much blood.
I'd faint for sure.
I think jesus still loves me. If he doesn't I'll make him love me if it kills him.
Could it be, am I him? I've wanted this day my whole life. To be free of the turmoil of wanting brings to mind the fact that I've never really been satisfied.
Can you see it in my face? could you smell it on my breath?
I'd rather have a cavity. Clean it yourself!

Slow Down Sunshine. You Have Boobies!...2 3!

Tuesday, April 24, 2007

David Blaine's best performance yet.


David Blaine Street Magic Part 2 - Click Here for more great videos and pictures!

A Key to Magick

I just realized a little key to effective magick. I heard this from Michael Beckwith in an interview with Bill Harris. He said that the universe can't recognize the difference between real action and symbolic action. So whenever you're working with "natural magnetism" (as Levi would put it), though you must act to bring about the results you want, those actions can be representations of the actual actions.
An intention without the will to act built into it is entirely impotent. You cannot just think and feel the things you want and have no intentions of acting on that. That sends a very definite intention out to the universe, and it's not really a very healthy one. Not only is it ineffective but it's libel to nurture some very disgusting habits.
There must be a will to act built into your intentions. The universe reflects back to you everything you put out. Every thought and emotion you experience literally changes the fabric of reality. So if your intention is idle you will see idleness, both in yourself and in others. But if you are willing to act you see willingness to act, both is yourself and in others.
Good news is, though, your actions can be symbolic. This is a great key to most practical magick. Now you can dance with ideas, have love affairs with your divinity, wine and dine your greatest potential, and thereby create them.

Another one from high school.

And one more still. This I wrote for my English teacher. She thought I was some sort of genius and wanted me to enter some kind of young writer's poetry contest. I showed her this one and she loved it but I never got around to actually entering it. I think it was because the prize was really lame. I have since almost entirely rewritten this one over the last couple years and I'm definitely more satisfied with my new version but I still like to look at this one as reflective of my position when I was around 16. I've left it untitled. I also left some little gaffs that I wouldn't normally keep in my poetry just as a reflection of my immaturity at the time. This one was written with a little more conscious intention but, as with most of my poetry, it was written in a flash without stopping to think.


As it flows in the somber summer air,
The wings bateing in the breeze.
It stops and stoops to stare awhile
The starts a step and flows with ease.

As it comes to cross a meadow brook,
With stones along the Babel shore
It sits and thinks and laughs a bit,
Then swim it must and flow some more.

Then sail to a tree on the summer air
It waits anew for another breeze
Then up and up it flies again
But trapped it is within the leaves.

A warm wind comes to comfort it
But from this trap no flow may jeer
And with response it states in sigh:
“Ah fuck it all, I’ll just die here.”

More high school poetry.

Yet another high school poem. This one has a similar story as the last one. I was sitting in drama class and this girl was pretending to die. She was a horrible loud mouth whose voice was absolutely wrenching. I just started the first couple lines based on her performance and the rest just kinda slipped out. I still like it. It has a decent pace and rhythm. I can't remember why I called it "journals".


Journals
I never knew the sound of death till
One took it to herself to die in mocking.
A gasp and rasp in voice befit her
As she grabbed and clenched her chest in laughing.
She fell to fear the ground that called her
But joked that dying comes when falling.
She cried a creed and fell when calling,
Out and up she winked a sigh and
Coughed and closed her eyes to all then
Looked up, laughed and died some more.
We all gathered, gawked and groped at
Her as writhing sang to us.
Then quite quick, as soon as starting,
She up and up and lived again.
She saw us gassed from groping gawking.
She saw us, smiled and pulled from her
The nagging, death knell, tolling needle
Then filled it, killed it and died for real.

Bio Notes

Here's another poem I wrote in high school. I really had no intentions or vision when I was writing it I just started putting words together when I was bored in Bio. I found it a couple years after I finished school on a page of notes so I just decided to call it "bio notes". I'm sure someone could start interpreting it to mean all sorts of things, especially as a position statement about the death penalty. I actually tried to interpret it a couple different ways and it does seem perfect in it's own quirky way but I'm constantly forced to consider whether or not the original intentions behind writing it affect the artistic value. Does the fact that I wrote unconsciously destroy any sort of artistic value? Could it elevate the value? I dunno. All I know is that I still enjoy reading it when I come across it.

Bio Notes.

Should one be let to live lest
Lives be lost to him?
Should lives lost
Be let to die
While mourning eyes be dry?
Death comes swift and lives as well
Come through to die in lives of hell.
Soft loves and thrashing hates
Come when life to death negates.
‘Till last light lifts ‘pon veils of eyes
Shall death come swift to he who dies.

Where do I go to be at Peace with the World?

here's a little poem that I wrote in high school. The question of the title was an assignment. We just had to answer the question. I like being dramatic sometimes.

Where do I go to be at peace with the world?

I go to the depths of the empyrean,
I sit in the basking glow of the dawning sun
‘Till the morrow’s eve breaks and the holy stars consume the day.
I sit in fields of grass and launder there ‘till
Shrubs devour themselves in the thought that I,
Like they, have not yet seen tomorrow’s burden.
I sit in a desolate room with no consoling hand
Upon my shoulder to help bring ends to ends
And cease the rolling thunder of pounding tears.
I sit perched, stooped and waiting, upon the edge of
The Abyss, peering down, holding on to reason
As the death knell tolls it’s final breath for life.
I sit to be at peace in the postures of the yogi
And as the trance consumes I see that peace is ever
With me but hidden by distractions.
I sit and revel in the shadow of the entire world
And hear the dreadful screams of the people
And I know that I will be at peace forever.

Monday, April 23, 2007

A New Conclusion to my Ethical Theory

The world is all that is the case.
The world can be viewed in a similar way that a body can be.
There are individual elements to the world just as cells in a body.
The world is not made up of the interactions between these elements but rather the interactions are a reflection of the world as a whole.
Each element in the world has a purpose.
The fulfillment of that purpose creates the unity of the world. This is the harmony of things.
The harmony of the world is evidenced in the dependence of each element on every other element.
Harmony creates efficiency just as much as vice versa.
The world craves and creates efficiency.
The purpose (the function for which the individual is best suited) of each individual can be recognized through careful examination of the choices, inclinations, and available circumstances of the individual.
The recognition of purpose allows the individual to fulfill that purpose efficiently.
The efficiency with which the individual fulfills their purpose is sufficient for either an objective or subjective observer to label those actions as either worthy or unworthy of approbation.
The purpose of the world and its "desire" for harmony lies in the singularity of existence and is necessarily apart from the duality of common reason.
The support for this lies in experience not in logic.
"Success is thy proof" -- Liber AL vel. Legis. sub figura 220.

I finally crystallized my thoughts but I'm still not sure if I'm entirely satisfied with it. I'll leave it as it is for now and I invite comments and criticisms but I'm going to be refining it constantly over the next few weeks. Also since I made a couple fairly questionable statements I'm going to be clarifying them with some examples and what not. Essentially though this is the philosophy upon which my entire life is built. It is heavily influenced by the philosophy of Aleister Crowley and The Book of the Law but I am not willing to claim that this is anything more than a personal interpretation of those works and that no one else should ever follow my example except in that they came to it on their own.

Saturday, April 21, 2007

Violence

Whats wrong with fighting? Is there anything wrong with controlled violence? We must distinguish between the controlled violence of sports or friendly competition or even to resolve disputes, and the violence of the random attack or for profit. But in a controlled situation between consenting adults (meaning people old enough or experienced enough to realize the consequences of their actions) what could possibly be wrong with violence? If anyone can tell me I'd like to hear it.

Cast iron cross.

give this a try.

Friday, April 20, 2007

Two keys to life.

I tried putting up a game yesterday as I said I would but for some reason the code was screwed up or something. Oh well.
I have no idea what I'm going to talk about today. I suppose the great secret to life might be a good place to start. I won't go into much detail because I'm really not feeling well today. I think I caught my girlfriend's cold or something. But anyways...

Recently certain thoughts kept creeping up into my head, thoughts about the most efficient ways to live and how to simplify "living strategies" into as few categories as possible. By living strategies I mean techniques that have a significant benefit to all (or most) areas of life. Essentially this has been my continual study since my mid teens and I must say I have amassed quite a heft arsenal of nifty little tricks. During the last few weeks however I've been trying to seriously reduce them to the simplest terms. I've been considering what techniques really dominate over the other ones. Then I started reading books like "Evolve your Brain" by Joe Dispenza, "biology of belief" by Bruce Lipton, and "the Future of the Body" by Michael Murphy. These books really didn't shed any light onto what I thought were useful methods of personal improvement but they did show me just how useful some techniques really were.
I've been aware of the power of Love and Concentration since I was about 18 years old. I realized that there is nothing in life that can't be done with a mind that can concentrate and a body full of love. What I didn't realize was that neuroscience was in the process of confirming this for me. In Dispenza's book he demonstrates that if a person wishes to change their body all they have to do is rewire the brain. To be able to rewire the brain however we need to do a couple of things. We need to get the neurons firing together. Then we need the neurons to wire together. Now, there are a couple of different ways this can be accomplished. The simplest way is simply to think the thoughts (or feel the feelings) you want to become permanent in a repetitve way. The more the neurons fire together the soon they will wire together. This is the lengthiest but easiest way to do things. We can also attach a strong emotion to the thought. The stronger the emotion the quicker the wiring. This also usually leads us to repeat the thought over and over again as well causing further reinforcement. Then Dispenza tells us that the same thing is true for our attention. That the more focused we are on one particular thing the more focused the brain can be on rewiring itself. Concentration produces stronger connections between neurons and therefore necessitates fewer repetitions.
I'm sure I haven't done justice to Dispenza's work but I think I got my point across. It's interesting to compare this with everything that every religious teacher has ever taught us. It's the same old things, focus your mind and fill yourself with love. Like Aleister Crowley says "Concentration is the key to life" and also "love is the law, love under will."
I guess thats all for now, I'll probably revisit this topic several times in the future to work out all the details. Till then stay fit and have fun.

Thursday, April 19, 2007

Fun with Math and Magick

Since yesterday's entry was so lame (due to the confusion I engorged myself with) I decided to give you some treats today. I'll start with just a normal little entry, boring to some enlightening to others, then later in the day I'll give you something special.
Today I want to talk a little about what I learned recently about mathematics.
A couple weeks ago I decided it might be a fun exercise to learn calculus in a week. I was entirely confident in myself when I started but I soon realized that my basic algebra and trigonometry competence was seriously wanting. I did end up learning all of the principles and basic applications of calculus within a week but I did need to take a few more days to brush up on my algebra so I could become more proficient at solving problems. So now I know calculus after only a couple of weeks. I'm no expert at it but I'd say I'm doing pretty good for someone who was recently completely deficient when it came to math.
Anyways, the reason I wanted to learn math in the first place was to get a hold of what math reveals about reality. I wanted to watch the mechanism of the mind in action and I figured numbers and graphs would be an alright place to start looking. It was all fun and games for a while but then yesterday I started to realize that math is as limited as anything else. Math is just another "language game" as Wittgenstein would say. It is not the purity of math that reveals anything, just the fact that it is a language. The only difference, however, between regular games and math games is the fact that very few people can find any attachment to numbers whereas certain words can be very emotionally charged (especially in combination, like "baby rape") It is language that creates the mind and the mind that creates reality. Is this true? I dunno. The great book of the Rota seems to suggest something along those lines but who knows. Right? So we can see the mind in a naked state by doing math problems.

Anyways, so yesterday I got a little jolt in my guts when I realized this. It was a good feeling knowing that I've cracked another piece of the puzzle (at least superficially) but I'm still not satisfied with it. Math contains more than that. I know it does, I can feel it. That statement in itself is a reflection of my current philosophy (whatever that means anymore) but I'll leave that for another day. For now lets consider this feeling and where it led me.
This morning after getting out of bed and molesting my girlfriend I started thinking about these "language games" of math and how they relate to the regular "language games" we play. I realized that the math games differ from common language games in that they can be played with without attachment. We can all play around with the calculus without investing any emotion or becoming fixated to ideas that can become filters for our experience. This is very useful as a training of the mind or as a meditation. So we can look at math as an exercise rather than a topic. It must be placed in the same category as meditation practices, brain gym type stuff, image streaming, painting and the like. We shouldn't be studying math, we should be practicing it. It allows us to access a very clear state of perception, uncontaminated by bias or experience. It allows us to experience pure thought. This is especially useful for those of us who want to reach states of perception that are not only free of bias but free of any sort of thought whatsoever. For instance during the operation of the sacred magic of Abramelin the mage. The practitioner needs to keep his focus. He needs to stay in a state of purity and receptivity while he awaits the movement of his angel. Unfortunately for him though it can get boring and sometimes boredom can cause attachment just as fast as any stimulus. So we can recommend math. Just get a few exercise books and work through them. Fun and safe!
Play around with this. Do some exercises in linear algebra or differential calculus and just watch how your mind works while you're doing them compared to how it normally works (even if you're not interested in attaining any sort of enlightenment). I think anyone could find it to be just as developmentally beneficial as poetry or painting.

I think that's all for now. Have fun.

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

ethics as a function of efficiency

How can we determine, from moment to moment, which acts produce optimal functioning and which ones don't?
We must assume that the universe craves optimization. By optimization I mean that the universe craves a state of working that is as efficient as possible while using the least amount of resources.
How do humans fit in?
Humans fulfill a function in the universal system. We must because we use resources and if we use any resources at all we must be an efficient means of fulfilling some function. What that function is I can only guess (possibly to provide the universe a self-awareness, or the possibility of some sort of growth) but it can be assumed that the universe is a system with an inclination towards progress (e.g. the arrow of time) and that it prefers to make that progress in an efficient way.
How does an element in a system knowingly fulfill it's function in an efficient way? First by noticing its role in the system. Humans can notice what function suits them best by simply looking back over the years of their lives. We all are presented with situations and choices in our lives that reflect an undeniable individuality in everyone. Our inclinations, humors, passions, distastes, are all manifestations (when differentiated from neuroses and misapprehensions) of our own most suited function. Once this is recognized each individual can then ask themselves, moment to moment, whether or not they are efficiently fulfilling that function or not. So called "virtue" then rests with the choice of whether or not to act in accordance with that function and "wickedness" lies with the impediment of the universal progress.

This is my first rough draft of this theory and over the coming days and weeks I'll be presenting new details and support. If you find anything wrong with it or just want to challenge something about it feel free to leave comments.

Monday, April 16, 2007

The practicality of Ethics.

The penultimate post on the construction of an ethical theory. Yesterday I reduced the requirements down to two easy breezy bite sized bits. Today I'll polish off the first of those.

An ethical system (rather than theory) must be practical. It must address the question "what should I do right now?" It needn't go into the future to answer anything theoretical. We must stay in the present and we must stay focused on our own business. If we were to start focusing on the future, hypothetical situations, and other people's business we'd be forced to construct the elements of the situation that we are not privy to. Unfortunately we are not privy to the majority of the crucial elements of any situation that falls under one (or more) of these categories.
I'll give just one example. If I were to ask "is it wrong if peter wants to masturbate in the library?" I would be forced to consider a whole bunch of things that are none of my business and possibly completely unknowable to me. I would have to know the definition of "wrong" both universally and how it relates to this situation. I would have to know how Peter feels about this "wrong". Does he comprehend the definition I give? Does he agree? Do the other patrons of the library agree? Say they don't agree, whose definition will take precedence? Does masturbation in general fall under this "wrong" heading? Does it fall under this heading within this particular context? We would also have to know little details about the general situation. Are there any other people in the library? Would they mind if Peter masturbated? If they do mind is it right or wrong for them to mind? What country is Peter in? Are the people there generally accepting of Peter's sexuality? If they aren't accepting of his sexuality is it right that they shouldn't be? How much does Peter want it? And most of all we'd be forced to ask questions like "do we have the right to define another persons actions in any way in any context?" Frankly I'm just not smart enough to be able to answer all of these questions, or even a fraction of them, with any sort of reasonable conviction. So I set it aside. I say "there must be a better way. Peter is the only one who knows about his situation and he's the only one that can tell us whether or not his actions are right or wrong (provided we can agree on a definition)."
These sorts of problems arise every single time we ask such questions. Whenever we get stuck in someone else's business or we get stuck in the past or future we are putting ourselves in a situation of great disadvantage. Our view of the past is necessarily skewed based on the generalizations, distortions, and ommisions that are essential components of memory. Our perception of the future is no better. We are forced to assume that we know what resources will be available and how those resources in that situation will combine to produce an outcome. The best we can hope for when considering the future is to conjecture about how we might react to certain contingencies. But this is only based on our present perception of our abilities, which can change in an instant, and which is based on our memories of the past (distorted, generalized, omitted).
We can not answer some of the necessary questions and the rest will be answered by guessing. So we stick to ourselves in the present and hopefully we can come to an awareness of what is optimal functioning for us. By staying in the present and staying focused on ourselves we can do away with most of traditional ethics and start living a lovely life. We really don't need a grand complex system or a set of rules that can be pinned down. All we need to know is how to optimize the present moment. That shouldn't be too hard seeing as how the human condition is wired to do this from birth.
Tomorrow I'll go over how we can find our own optimal functioning.

Sunday, April 15, 2007

More on developing an ethical theory

A bit more about ethics perhaps?
What is it that we need for a decent ethical theory? First of all it has to be practical. We must be able to refer to the theory whenever we're in doubt as to the proper course of action. This means that it must also be complete. If we were to govern our lives by a theory that failed to adress even 5% of the situations we might encounter we'd be stuck (theoretically) in those situations. No one wants to be stuck.
Second the theory must provide us a methodology that leads us to optimal functioning in the situations we apply it to. Now, this will necessarily mean everyone will have a different definition of optimal functioning so we must be able to give the theory sufficient flexibility to address the relativity of the subjective condition.
In my opinion this should be sufficient to build a theory on. We needn't confuse things by adding anything more. With these two criteria we should be able get somewhere fairly decent without a whole lot of muddling philosophical nonsense. The more we philosophize, especially about philosophy, the further we get from the present moment and the closer we come to being entirely wrapped up in the ego. This usually leads to some fairly fancy and good looking theories but often leaves us no better off in our "real lives".

Saturday, April 14, 2007

Ethics and the present moment

I'd like to talk a little more about ethics today. First off what is Ethics? My first philosophy prof defined it by saying that it was a way to figure out how to act in the best possible way in whatever circumstances are present. So where metaphysics is the philosophy of reality, and epistemology is the philosophy of knowledge, ethics is the philosophy of the now. Instantly when I put it in these terms new doors of consideration open up for me. I begin to remember what many great men have said about the present moment. Like Wittgenstein:"he who lives in the present moment lives in eternity", or Einstein who said something along the lines of "the only real time is the present moment. Everything else is a mental construct."(paraphrased) With these considerations I come to see ethics in an entirely new light. I begin to see it as the sole philosophy capable of transcending the borders of the mind and enable us to see past the meagre capacities we're used to so we can live perfect lives. Ethics really is a practical philosophy. Every moment you live can be dictated by an ethical theory if you let it. All that I'd ask is that the theory stays in the present, focused on you and nobody else. It must necessarily be a subjective theory, a set of rules that the individual sets up for himself in his own best interest. As soon as you start considering things like the categorical imperative with all its consideration on universal law, or utilitarianism with its consideration of spreading happiness, you start getting muddled up with things that are part of that mental construct. You divest yourself of the present moment and begin considering things from someone else's perspective. This leads to all sorts of assumptions about things that really aren't any of your business and that you could never hope to have a clue about how to deal with. Staying present becomes worthy of approbation in itself.
Later I'll relate this to an established ethical theory and go into more of the practical aspects of the present moment (esp. how it relates to the ego).