Who May Know Their Complete Likeness, When So Much Is Being Hidden. The Astrals, Elementals, Mind, And

“Who may know their complete likeness, when so much is being hidden. The Astrals, Elementals, Mind, and Soul. We realise something of the body’s mechanism and of the affectiveness of the whole; at its interrelations we may only guess. Every fact gleaned shows us merely greater ignorance of ourselves. Therefore, speak not of God, speak for yourself alone, for when you know yourself you will know your Gods.”

—

Austin Osman Spare 1886-1956

“A witch is, actually, a successful (in the sense of surviving) deviant. You have a cultural, ideological, social, what-not pattern which is, for that society in question, normal (and, importantly, this is understood as a synonym for natural). Most people survive because they conform to these patterns, because they behave normally. […] But then suddenly you get a deviant which survives, and since it does not draw its support from the normal pattern, […] that deviant is understood as drawing its support from “unknown,” “supernatural” sources. […] If we cannot survive without our order, how can she [the witch] survive in solitude? Hers must be indeed a very powerful order to exist so independently, without all the inter cooperation and individual compromise which we have to go through to survive. And if it is so powerful, then it could destroy us. We must try to destroy it first.”

— Maya Deren, “From the Notebook of Maya Deren”, c.October 1947, vol. 14: pages 21–45. (via maddiviner)

“It is an ancient truth that all things contain the seed of their opposites, and thus it is that hidden deep within the limitless abyss of the Negative Existence is the Positive. This is echoed in the ancient British belief that stands in stark contrast to the modern conception of blackness as a stagnant state of finality, rather darkness was considered as a fertile seed-bed whose loam would give rise to Light. It was this belief that darkness begets light that led our ancestors to begin their day at twilight and their year with the dark period, winter preceding summer. In the same way alchemists considered nigredo (the ‘black chaos’) essential to the operation, because Nature can only restore itself after first dying away, this being symbolised by the black crow perched atop the caput mortuum at the start of the journey.”

— Martin Duffy - The Devil’s Raiments: Habiliments of the Witch’s Craft

Mew #151

Super Nova Genesis

There is so much magic to be found in cities. In mine, there are many vacant lots and desolate spaces where plants grow through the concrete and vines wind up the walls of empty buildings - and there is magic there. But there is also magic in busy cities, in the telephone wires that string across the rooftops and in the window-lights of skyscrapers in the early hours. There is magic in looking down on the morning traffic rush, at dawn, and watching cars speed by. I firmly believe there is magic and energy in anything and everything, if you choose to look for it, and have a heart open enough to find it.