This lesson is the final one in the current series that calls for a precise definition of the terms in its title, since the twelfth and concluding study is, perhaps, fortunate in having a title word that has so far escaped misuse and distortion from its original sense.
The Magic Wand. These words stir everything the young beginner in Occult art can conjure in his mind: the midnight magician with his mysterious, perhaps diabolical, arts, muttering incantations, working gruesome spells, and summoning the restless ghosts of the dead. Strange fancies indeed—yet so corrupted and ignorant have popular conceptions become regarding the once sacred Science of the Temple and the psychological powers of Nature that we seriously doubt whether the ideas just described differ much from what each modern student originally imagined before becoming acquainted with the deeper truths—the realities of Occult philosophy.
We begin by carefully investigating the original meaning of the words Magic Wand, since those who were the masters and originators of these terms are far more likely to know more about them than their degenerate offspring of a later age. Comparatively few would believe that MAGIC, MASON, and IMAGINATION are today unrelated descendants of the same original conception—THE ROOT IDEA; but such is the case. First, then, let us examine their modern meanings. Magic is the unholy art of working secret spells, of using invisible powers, and of holding intercourse with the unseen world of ghosts and demons through enchantments. It also denotes the expert deception of the senses by a conjurer's tricks—so-called hocus-pocus and fraud—and a magician is either an evil-minded, superstitious mortal foolish enough to believe in charms, or an expert pretender and first-rate impostor who cheats and deceives people. A mason is the honorable designation of a builder who works in stone; metaphysically, a member of a semi-secret society whose sole advantage is social intercourse and standing; who proclaims fraternity and universal brotherhood in theory and practices the reverse in reality; a man who apes the Egyptian Mason, knows nothing in reality of Hiram, his master; who knows nothing of the starry Solomon or his mystic temple in the heavens, which Hiram built; and who misconceives the import of the three villains, or assassins; and who, further, knows nothing of that wonderful sprig of myrtle—in short, a Free Mason, speaking generally, is a man who delights in ideals, social equality, secret fraternity, and plays at mysticism; who parades on the Masonic stage and enacts a role he does not understand. The first meaning, that of a builder, is the most correct. Lastly, the imagination is the exercise of mental imagery—the picturings of silent thought.
Now let us proceed BACKWARDS. Imagination comes from the word "image," a form, a picture, and has descended to us from the Latin "imago," which in turn was derived from the old Semitic root "mag." Mason comes to us from the Latin "mass," which means to mould and form, i.e., to build; and the word "mass," through various transformations, was also derived from the root-word "mag." Consequently, originally there was but little difference in the ancient idea of building pictures in the mind and erecting the mental idea externally in stone. From this fact we have today Mental Masons, after the fashion of the secret orders, and stone masons, who labor for wages. The Mental Masons have merely lost the knowledge of their art. By rights they should be as active and correspondingly useful today as their more physical brothers, the masons of stone.
This art would never have fallen into disgrace and disuse if their daily bread, or material accumulations, had depended upon their efforts in building up the mental, moral, and spiritual attainments of each other, and in bringing their knowledge into more external use by making the material edifice—the physical body—a purer and more fitting temple for the Divine soul.
Magic comes from the Latin "magi" and the Greek word "magos," which means wise, learned in the mysteries, and was the synonym of wisdom. The initiated philosopher, the priest, and the wise men are all included in the "magi." Again, tracing this word to its remote ancestor, we find it terminating in the same Semitic root "mag," but of this strange root no one was able to say much, except that it seemed to belong to the Assyrian branch of the great Semitic race. But quite recently, thanks to our scientific explorers and archaeologists versed in the mysterious meaning of cuneiform inscription, Assyrian scholars now inform us that they have found the hoary, primitive original of it—of magic, magi, and imago, etc. It comes from an old Akkadian word, "imga," meaning wise, holy, and learned, and was used as the distinguishing title of their wisest sages, priests, and philosophers, who, as may be supposed, gradually formed a peculiar caste that merged into the ruling priestly order. The Semites, who succeeded the old Akkadian race in the valley of the Euphrates, as a mere matter of verbal convenience, transformed many of the old Akkadian words to suit their own articulation, and "imga" became "mag," and thus "magi." THE BLEND between the Semitic and the older Akkadian race produced, by fusion of racial blood, the famed Chaldeans. So we see how old are the words many of us daily use, but with different meaning. Truly, when one thinks of magic and its origin, it makes one feel as though he were quite nearly related to the people who honored King Sargon, the Wise—the earthly original of the mystic Solomon of Biblical tradition. The term Wand is an old Saxon word that primarily signifies to set in motion, to move. From this we derive our word wander, i.e., to roam, and wandering, i.e., moving and continually restless.
We now have the original, therefore real, meaning of the words Magic Wand: thus an object that sets in motion the powers of the magician, and the magician, an Initiate of the sacred rites—A MASTER OF WISDOM, possessing all the resources that enable him TO BUILD, mould, and form; to create, in fact, by virtue of his knowledge of the secret powers of mental imagery and the potential use of his own imagination. He is both Mental Mason and learned philosopher.
The student may doubtless ask why all this care and labor regarding mere definitions. We reply that it is because the real meaning of the words we have purposely selected for the title of our studies are, in themselves, a far better revelation than we could possibly have written. Originally, ideas and words were related as absolute expressions or correspondences of each other. This is not so now. As the different races became interblended, the purity of both language and morals retrograded, and the people grew more to the external. The intuitions and spirit were compelled to retreat, giving place to only the intellectual and mental. The blending of languages gave birth to many words wherein different meanings were transmitted; hence the trouble arising today over the numerous interpretations of a single word.
Hybrid races have no such thing as a pure language. Their ideas and language, like their blood, are badly mixed up, confusing, and unsatisfactory, so far as the real meaning of the words is concerned. For this very reason we find so many different meanings for the same word; and also for this reason, we cannot formulate a legal enactment in the Anglo-Saxon tongue that a learned lawyer, versed in this senseless jugglery of words, cannot demonstrate, to the satisfaction of the courts, means something the very opposite of the real intentions—the spirit—which the framers thereof intended it to convey. Anciently, it required no artful cunning of the lawyer to interpret the laws. The words had only one simple and obvious meaning. If a language could be so constructed today, and the antiquated precedents of the courts annihilated, the legal profession would be exterminated inside of twelve months, and an affliction removed from the people.
The philosophy of the Magic Wand is this. It is a magnetic, electric conductor for the magician's will. It directs the flow of his thought and concentrates it upon a given point in space or an object. It is, magically, what the sights of a rifle are to a sportsman. It enables him to focus his powers with exact precision upon the mark against which, or upon which, his will is directed. Apart from this there is no power, per se, in the Wand itself, any more than there is in a lightning conductor without the electric storm. Ergo, the Wand is the conductor, in the magician's hand, for the lightnings of the soul; and just as the lightning rod is most useful and most powerful to protect when the storm is the strongest, so is the Wand most powerful in the hands of the most potential magician. We can only transmit through this Wand the degree of force we may happen to possess in the soul.
In a properly prepared Wand lies the most powerful weapon to protect or destroy that can be placed within a magician's hands. With his own spiritual force and knowledge, combined with the magic power attached to the instrument, nothing can withstand its power when directed with a determined and powerful will.
Many substances have been employed in the manufacture of these Magic Wands. Metals or stones will not serve this purpose unless covered with some organic matter. In any case stones are worthless. The very finest Wands are made from the live ivory of a female elephant. A short Wand, twenty-one inches long, tipped with gold at the largest end and silver or copper at the other, is very powerful. Next to these costly articles are Wands with a gold or copper core—a wire, in fact—cased with ebony, boxwood, rosewood, cedar, or sandalwood. English yew also serves the purpose; so does almond wood. Simpler, less expensive, and almost as effective are Wands made of witch-hazel. In fact, apart from the Wands of live ivory, I consider that witch-hazel is as powerful as the golden Wand. Next in force to this witch-hazel are the shoots of the almond tree, and lastly the peach and swamp willow.
The proper time to manufacture a Magic Wand is whenever you can find the person who is able to do the work. But after it is constructed it must be thoroughly magnetized, with proper ceremony and aspiration, the first or the second full Moon after the Sun enters Capricorn, at midnight, when the Moon will be culminating in her own sign upon the mid-heaven.
The best time TO CUT a shoot of witch-hazel or other material for a Wand is the first full Moon after the Sun's entry into Capricorn, at midnight, and then magnetize it upon the next full Moon at the same hour.
In conclusion, let us repeat that the Magic Wand is but the highly sensitive magical medium for transmitting and concentrating the force of the learned magician; that it is equally powerful under great excitement of mind, WHETHER USED CONSCIOUSLY OR NOT. The stream of mental fire will go in the direction the Wand happens to be pointed, and therefore it should never be in the hands of the wicked or foolish, any more than firearms. It is potential or otherwise in exact proportion to the artist's wisdom and dynamic mentality, and is useless in the hands of the idiotic or weak-minded. A Magic Wand requires brains and vigorous mental force to make it effective, just as the steam engine requires an apparatus for generating the steam that moves it. With a determined will, and a mental conception of one's inward power, any man or woman can, by means of this sensitive Wand, defy all the legionaries of Hell, and quickly disperse every form of spiritual iniquity.
The firearms that have become so intricate in their mechanism and so destructive in their operations are only a degeneration of the Magic Wand. The first weapons of warfare and slaughter were very crude and clumsy, then larger and more destructive, until at last they have become as fine in texture and mechanical genius, compared with their early brothers, as the Magic Wand is today above and beyond the present weapons of warfare. At last, the original mode of defense will be rediscovered and become a utility in the hands of the majority of mankind. At the same time, the mental and moral nature will be evolving into better conditions too, so that their use will not be given to the ignorant and evildoers, but placed in charge of the educated—those who are morally capable of leading and ruling.
Yes, we are now stepping upon the plane of reason and intuition, where right, not might, will prevail and rule the world. The present mode of government and rule will be changed, and one of humanitarian justice will take its place.
God hasten the Millenium.