Book 4 Part II Magick.pdf

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studied the diseases of the colon until he could see nothing else, and
then calmly proposed to cut out every one’s colon, pointing out that a
vulture (who has no colon) is a very long-lived bird. As a matter of fact
the longevity of the vulture is due to its twisted neck, and many thoughful
persons propose to experiment on Professor Metchnikoff.
But the worst of all phantasms are the moral ideas and
the religious ideas. Sanity consists in the faculty of adjusting ideas
in proper proportion. Any one who accepts a moral or religious truth
without understanding it is only kept out of the asylum because he does
not follow it out logically. If one really believed in Christianity, 1 if one
really thought that the majority of mankind was doomed to eternal
punishment, one would go raving about the world trying to “save”
people. Sleep would not be possible until the horror of the mind left
the body exhausted. Otherwise, one must be morally insane. Which
of us can sleep if one we love is in danger of mere death? We cannot
even see a dog drown without at least interrupting all our business to
look on. Who then can live in London and reflect upon the fact that
of its seven million souls, all but about a thousand Plymouth Brethren
will be damned? Yet the thousand Plymouth Brethren (who are the
loudest in proclaiming that they will be the only ones saved) seem to
1 “One would go mad if one took the Bible seriously; but to take it seriously one
must be already mad.”—Crowley.