The Book of Ceremonial Magic

...behind Magic, or that even the occult sanctuaries possess their own secrets and mysteries. Their self-proclaimed original: "self-imputed" proponents claim that the written rituals we have are either a corrupt and scandalous mockery, a trivial and misunderstood version, or—in a more mild view—merely "as moonlight is to sunlight and as water is to wine." These proponents withhold their authorizations original: "warrants".

But whether they have these authorizations or not, it should be said at the outset: if these secrets and mysteries focus on psychic powers and wonders rather than spiritual grace, then God is not present in those sanctuaries. Let a mystic assure the occult student that because they are dealing here with the sickening follies of a distracted inner world, they would encounter those same follies carried to the absolute extreme original: "ne plus ultra"; Latin for "nothing further beyond," meaning the highest possible point in those alleged "secret schools"—assuming they could even gain entry.

For this reason, these texts might actually be more harmless because they are so ridiculous and, for the most part, impossible to actually perform. This explains why it is acceptable to bring these various rituals out from centuries of obscurity. They would be horrifying original: "abominable" if we thought they were meant to be taken seriously. This criticism applies to all surviving original: "extant" rituals, regardless of their claims or outward appearance. Some are more absurd than others, and some are perhaps more wicked original: "iniquitous", but they are all tainted by Black Magic in the same way that every "idle word" is said to be tainted by sin. The difference between White and Black Magic is simply the difference between a thoughtless word and an evil one.

Naturally, it would be unwise to claim that everyone who tries to perform these ceremonies would fail to get any results. In the past, the majority of such experiments likely produced results of some kind. Entering the path of hallucination is likely to guarantee hallucination. Given what we know about hypnosis, clairvoyance original: "clairvoyant"; the alleged ability to gain information about an object, person, location, or physical event through extrasensory perception, and a thousand similar phenomena, it would be absurd to think that the many "seeing" processes of Ancient Magic did not produce some form of seership. Similarly, the self-hypnotic state that many magical rituals tend to create likely induced such states in people who were susceptible—and not always only in them. To this degree, some of these processes are "practical," and to that same degree, they are dangerous.

For the sake of clarity, this book is divided into two parts. The first part provides an analytical and critical account of the main magical rituals known to me. The second part forms a complete Grimoire original: "Grimoire"; a textbook of magic, typically including instructions on how to summon supernatural entities or create magical objects of Black Magic. It must be remembered that these are the very practices that provided evidence for the Inquisitors original: "Inquisitors"; officials of the Catholic Church responsible for finding and punishing heresy of the past. These rituals justified the bloody original: "sanguinary" decrees that civil courts of that era issued against witches, warlocks, and magicians. It is, truly, a very strange and unsettling page of history.