Contents
Liber Dcccxxxvii
{Book 837}
The Law
of Liberty A Tract of To Mega Vhrion 666
That is a Magus 9°=2 A.·.a.·.
This Epistle first appeared in The Equinox III(1)(Detroit:
Universal, 1919), and is an expository commentary on Liber Legis--The Book
of the Law, from which the quotations are taken.--h.b.
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
I
I Am Often Asked why I begin my letters in this way. No matter whether I am
writing to my lady or to my butcher, always I begin with these eleven words.
Why, how else should I begin? What other greeting could be so glad? Look, brother,
we are free! Rejoice with me, sister, there is no law beyond Do what thou wilt!
Ii
I Write this for those who have not read our Sacred book, The Book of the Law,
or for those who, reading it, have somehow failed to understand its perfection.
For there are many matters in this Book, and the Glad Tidings are now here,
now there, scattered throughout the Book as the Stars are scattered through
the field of Night. Rejoice with me, all ye people! At the very head of the
Book stands the great charter of our godhead: 'Every man and every woman is
a star.' We are all free, all independent, all shining gloriously, each one
a radiant world. Is not that good tidings?
Then comes the first call of the Great Goddess Nuit, Lady of the Starry Heaven,
who is also Matter in its deepest metaphysical sense, who is the infinite in
whom all we live and move and have our being. Hear Her first summons to us men
and women: 'Come forth, o children, under the stars, eat rich foods and drink
sweet wines and wines that foam! Also, take your fill and will of love as ye
will, when, where, and with whom ye will! But always unto me.'
This is the only point to bear in mind, that every act must be a ritual, an
act of worship, a sacrament. Live as the kings and princes, crowned and uncrowned,
of this world, have always lived, as masters always live; but let it not be
self-indulgence; make your self- indulgence your religion.
When you drink and dance and take delight, you are not being 'immoral,' you
are not 'risking your immortal soul'; you are fulfilling the precepts of our
holy religion--provided only that you remember to regard your actions in this
light. Do not lower yourself and destroy and cheapen your pleasure by leaving
out the supreme joy, the consciousness of the Peace that passeth understanding.
Do not embrace mere Marian or Melusine; she is Nuit Herself, specially concentrated
and incarnated in a human form to give you infinite love, to bid you taste even
on earth the Elixir of Immortality. 'But ecstasy be thine and joy of earth:
ever To me! To me!'
Again She speaks: 'Love is the law, love under will.' Keep pure your highest
ideal; strive ever toward it without allowing aught to sto˙ you or turn you
aside, even as a star sweeps upon its incalculable and infinite course of glory,
and all is Love. The Law of your being becomes Light, Life, Love and Liberty.
All is peace, all is harmony and beauty, all is joy.
For hear, how gracious is the Goddess; 'I give unimaginable joys on earth:
certainty, not faith, while in life, upon death; peace unutterable, rest, ecstasy;
nor do I demand aught in sacrifice.'
Is this not better than the death-in-life of the slaves of the Slave- Gods,
as they go oppressed by consciousness of 'sin,' wearily seeking or simulating
wearisome and tedious 'virtues'?
With such, we who have accepted the Law of Thelema have nothing to do. We have
heard the Voice of the Star-Goddess: 'I love you! I yearn to you! Pale or purple,
veiled or voluptuous, I who am all pleasure and purple, and drunkenness of the
innermost sense, desire you. Put on the wings, and arouse the coiled splendour
within you: come unto me!' And thus She ends:
'Sing the rapturous love-song unto me! Burn to me perfumes! Wear to me jewels!
Drink to me, for I love you! I love you! I am the blue- lidded daughter of Sunset;
I am the naked brilliance of the voluptuous night-sky. To me! To me!' And with
these words 'The Manifestation of Nuit is at an end.'
Iii
In The Next Chapter of our book is given the word of Hadit, who is the complement
of Nuit. He is eternal energy, the Infinite Motion of Things, the central core
of all being. The manifested Universe comes from the marriage of Nuit and Hadit;
without this could no thing be. This eternal, this perpetual marriage-feast
is then the nature of things themselves; and therefore everything that is, is
a crystallization of divine ecstasy.
Hadit tells us of Himiself: 'I am the flame that burns in every heart of man,
and in the core of every star.' He is then your own inmost divine self; it
is you, and not another, who are lost in the constant rapture of the embraces
of Infinite Beauty. A little further on He speaks of us:
'We are not for the poor and the sad: the lords of the earth are our kinsfolk.'
'Is a God to live in a dog? No! but the highest are of us. They shall rejoice,
our chosen: who sorroweth is not of us.'
'Beauty and strength, leaping laughter and delicious languor, force and fire,
are of us.' Later, concerning death, He says: 'Think not, o king, upon that
lie: That Thou Must Die: verily thou shalt not die, but live. Now let it be
understood: If the body of the King dissolve, he shall remain in pure ecstasy
for ever.' When you know that, what is left but delight? And how are we to
live meanwhile?
'It is a lie, this folly against self.' {...} 'Be strong, o man! lust, enjoy
all things of sense and rapture: fear not that any God shall deny thee for this.'
Again and again, in words like these, He sees the expansion and the develo˙ment
of the soul through joy.
Here is the Calendar of our Church: 'But ye, o my people, rise up & awake!
Let the rituals be rightly performed with joy a feast for life and a greater feast for death!
A feast every day in your hearts in the joy of my rapture! A feast every night
unto Nu, and the pleasure of uttermost delight! Aye! feast! rejoice! there is
no dread hereafter. There is the dissolution, and eternal ecstasy in the kisses
of Nu.' It all depends on your own acceptance of this new law, and you are
not asked to believe anything, to accept a string of foolish fables beneath
the intellectual level of a Bushman and the moral level of a drug-fiend. All
you have to do is to be yourself, to do your will, and to rejoice.
'Dost thou fail? Art thou sorry? Is fear in thine heart?' He says again:
'Where I am, these are not.' There is much more of the same kind; enough has
been quoted already to make all clear. But there is a further injunction. 'Wisdom
says: be strong! Then canst thou bear more joy. Be not animal; refine thy rapture!
If thou drink, drink by the eight and ninety rules of art: if thou love, exceed
by delicacy; and if thou do aught joyous, let there be subtlety therein! But
exceed! exceed! Strive ever to more! and if thou art truly mine--and doubt it
not, an if thou art ever joyous!--death is the crown of all.'
Lift yourselves up, my brothers and sisters of the earth! Put beneath your
feet all fears, all qualms, all hesitancies! Lift yourselves up! Come forth,
free and joyous, by night and day, to do your will; for 'There is no law beyond
Do what thou wilt.' Lift yourselves up! Walk forth with us in Light and Life
and Love and Liberty, taking our pleasure as Kings and Queens in Heaven and
on Earth.
The sun is arisen; the spectre of the ages has been put to flight. 'The word
of Sin is Restriction,' or as it has been otherwise said on this text: That
is Sin, to hold thine holy spirit in!
Go on, go on in thy might; and let no man make thee afraid.
Love is the law, love under will.
{Book 837}
The Law
of Liberty A Tract of To Mega Vhrion 666
That is a Magus 9°=2 A.·.a.·.
This Epistle first appeared in The Equinox III(1)(Detroit:
Universal, 1919), and is an expository commentary on Liber Legis--The Book
of the Law, from which the quotations are taken.--h.b.
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
I
I Am Often Asked why I begin my letters in this way. No matter whether I am
writing to my lady or to my butcher, always I begin with these eleven words.
Why, how else should I begin? What other greeting could be so glad? Look, brother,
we are free! Rejoice with me, sister, there is no law beyond Do what thou wilt!
Ii
I Write this for those who have not read our Sacred book, The Book of the Law,
or for those who, reading it, have somehow failed to understand its perfection.
For there are many matters in this Book, and the Glad Tidings are now here,
now there, scattered throughout the Book as the Stars are scattered through
the field of Night. Rejoice with me, all ye people! At the very head of the
Book stands the great charter of our godhead: 'Every man and every woman is
a star.' We are all free, all independent, all shining gloriously, each one
a radiant world. Is not that good tidings?
Then comes the first call of the Great Goddess Nuit, Lady of the Starry Heaven,
who is also Matter in its deepest metaphysical sense, who is the infinite in
whom all we live and move and have our being. Hear Her first summons to us men
and women: 'Come forth, o children, under the stars, eat rich foods and drink
sweet wines and wines that foam! Also, take your fill and will of love as ye
will, when, where, and with whom ye will! But always unto me.'
This is the only point to bear in mind, that every act must be a ritual, an
act of worship, a sacrament. Live as the kings and princes, crowned and uncrowned,
of this world, have always lived, as masters always live; but let it not be
self-indulgence; make your self- indulgence your religion.
When you drink and dance and take delight, you are not being 'immoral,' you
are not 'risking your immortal soul'; you are fulfilling the precepts of our
holy religion--provided only that you remember to regard your actions in this
light. Do not lower yourself and destroy and cheapen your pleasure by leaving
out the supreme joy, the consciousness of the Peace that passeth understanding.
Do not embrace mere Marian or Melusine; she is Nuit Herself, specially concentrated
and incarnated in a human form to give you infinite love, to bid you taste even
on earth the Elixir of Immortality. 'But ecstasy be thine and joy of earth:
ever To me! To me!'
Again She speaks: 'Love is the law, love under will.' Keep pure your highest
ideal; strive ever toward it without allowing aught to sto˙ you or turn you
aside, even as a star sweeps upon its incalculable and infinite course of glory,
and all is Love. The Law of your being becomes Light, Life, Love and Liberty.
All is peace, all is harmony and beauty, all is joy.
For hear, how gracious is the Goddess; 'I give unimaginable joys on earth:
certainty, not faith, while in life, upon death; peace unutterable, rest, ecstasy;
nor do I demand aught in sacrifice.'
Is this not better than the death-in-life of the slaves of the Slave- Gods,
as they go oppressed by consciousness of 'sin,' wearily seeking or simulating
wearisome and tedious 'virtues'?
With such, we who have accepted the Law of Thelema have nothing to do. We have
heard the Voice of the Star-Goddess: 'I love you! I yearn to you! Pale or purple,
veiled or voluptuous, I who am all pleasure and purple, and drunkenness of the
innermost sense, desire you. Put on the wings, and arouse the coiled splendour
within you: come unto me!' And thus She ends:
'Sing the rapturous love-song unto me! Burn to me perfumes! Wear to me jewels!
Drink to me, for I love you! I love you! I am the blue- lidded daughter of Sunset;
I am the naked brilliance of the voluptuous night-sky. To me! To me!' And with
these words 'The Manifestation of Nuit is at an end.'
Iii
In The Next Chapter of our book is given the word of Hadit, who is the complement
of Nuit. He is eternal energy, the Infinite Motion of Things, the central core
of all being. The manifested Universe comes from the marriage of Nuit and Hadit;
without this could no thing be. This eternal, this perpetual marriage-feast
is then the nature of things themselves; and therefore everything that is, is
a crystallization of divine ecstasy.
Hadit tells us of Himiself: 'I am the flame that burns in every heart of man,
and in the core of every star.' He is then your own inmost divine self; it
is you, and not another, who are lost in the constant rapture of the embraces
of Infinite Beauty. A little further on He speaks of us:
'We are not for the poor and the sad: the lords of the earth are our kinsfolk.'
'Is a God to live in a dog? No! but the highest are of us. They shall rejoice,
our chosen: who sorroweth is not of us.'
'Beauty and strength, leaping laughter and delicious languor, force and fire,
are of us.' Later, concerning death, He says: 'Think not, o king, upon that
lie: That Thou Must Die: verily thou shalt not die, but live. Now let it be
understood: If the body of the King dissolve, he shall remain in pure ecstasy
for ever.' When you know that, what is left but delight? And how are we to
live meanwhile?
'It is a lie, this folly against self.' {...} 'Be strong, o man! lust, enjoy
all things of sense and rapture: fear not that any God shall deny thee for this.'
Again and again, in words like these, He sees the expansion and the develo˙ment
of the soul through joy.
Here is the Calendar of our Church: 'But ye, o my people, rise up & awake!
Let the rituals be rightly performed with joy a feast for life and a greater feast for death!
A feast every day in your hearts in the joy of my rapture! A feast every night
unto Nu, and the pleasure of uttermost delight! Aye! feast! rejoice! there is
no dread hereafter. There is the dissolution, and eternal ecstasy in the kisses
of Nu.' It all depends on your own acceptance of this new law, and you are
not asked to believe anything, to accept a string of foolish fables beneath
the intellectual level of a Bushman and the moral level of a drug-fiend. All
you have to do is to be yourself, to do your will, and to rejoice.
'Dost thou fail? Art thou sorry? Is fear in thine heart?' He says again:
'Where I am, these are not.' There is much more of the same kind; enough has
been quoted already to make all clear. But there is a further injunction. 'Wisdom
says: be strong! Then canst thou bear more joy. Be not animal; refine thy rapture!
If thou drink, drink by the eight and ninety rules of art: if thou love, exceed
by delicacy; and if thou do aught joyous, let there be subtlety therein! But
exceed! exceed! Strive ever to more! and if thou art truly mine--and doubt it
not, an if thou art ever joyous!--death is the crown of all.'
Lift yourselves up, my brothers and sisters of the earth! Put beneath your
feet all fears, all qualms, all hesitancies! Lift yourselves up! Come forth,
free and joyous, by night and day, to do your will; for 'There is no law beyond
Do what thou wilt.' Lift yourselves up! Walk forth with us in Light and Life
and Love and Liberty, taking our pleasure as Kings and Queens in Heaven and
on Earth.
The sun is arisen; the spectre of the ages has been put to flight. 'The word
of Sin is Restriction,' or as it has been otherwise said on this text: That
is Sin, to hold thine holy spirit in!
Go on, go on in thy might; and let no man make thee afraid.
Love is the law, love under will.
