7. The Septenary Of Talismansa

CEREMONIES, vestments, perfumes, characters and figures being, as we have stated, necessary to apply imagination to the education of the will, the success of magical works depends upon the faithful observation of all the Rites, which are in no sense fantastic or arbitrary. They have been transmitted to us by antiquity and obtain permanently by the essential laws of analogical realization and of the correspondence which interbinds ideas and forms. Having spent many years in consulting and comparing all the most authentic Grimoires and magical Rituals, we have succeeded, not without labour, in reconstituting the Ceremonial of universal and primeval Magic. The only serious books which we have seen upon this subject are in manuscript, written in conventional characters which we have deciphered by the help of the Polygraphy of Trithemius. The importance of others consists wholly in the hieroglyphs and symbols which adorn them, the truth of the images being disguised under the superstitious fictions of a mystifying text. Such, for example, is the Enchiridion of Pope Leo III, which has never been printed with its true figures, and we have reconstructed it for our own use after an ancient manuscript. The Rituals known under the name of Clavicles Of Solomon are very numerous. Many have been printed, while others remain in manuscripts, transcribed with great care. An exceedingly fine and elegantly written example is preserved in the Imperial Library; it is enriched with Pantacles and characters, most of which have been reproduced in the Magical Calendars of Tycho Brahe and Duchentau. Lastly, there are printed Clavicles and Grimoires which are catchpenny mystifications and impostures of dishonest publishers. The book so notorious and decried formerly under the name of Little Albert belongs mainly to the latter category: some talismanic figures, and some calculations borrowed from Paracelsus, are its only serious parts. In any matter of Realization and Ritual, Paracelsus is an imposing magical authority. No one has accomplished works greater than his, and for that very reason he conceals the virtue of ceremonies and merely teaches in his occult philosophy the existence of that magnetic agent which is omnipotence of will; he sums also the whole science of characters in two signs, the macrocosmic and microcosmic stars. It was sufficient for the adepts, and it was important not to initiate the vulgar. Paracelsus therefore did not teach the Ritual, but he practised, and his practice was a sequence of miracles. We have spoken of the magical importance of the triad and tetrad. Their combination constitutes the great religious and kabalistic number which represents the universal synthesis and comprises the sacred septenary. In the belief of the ancients, the world is governed by seven secondary causes - secundii, as Trithemius calls them - which are the universal forces designated by Moses under the plural name of Eloim, gods. These forces, analogous and contrary to one another, produce equilibrium by their contrasts and rule the movement of the spheres. The Hebrews termed them the seven great archangels, giving them the names of Michael, Gabriel, Raphael, Anael, Samael, Zadkiel and Oriphiel. The Christian Gnostics named the four last Uriel, Barachiel, Sealtiel and Jehudiel. Other nations attributed to these spirits the government of the seven chief planets, and assigned to them the names of their chief divinities. All believed in their relative influence; astronomy divided the antique heaven between them and allotted the seven days of the week to their successive rule. Such is the reason of the various Ceremonies of the magical week and the septenary cultus of the planets.