Magick is the science and art of causing change to occur in conformity with will.
Interpretation
This quote suggests that magick involves both knowledge and creativity to enact one's desires.
Aleister Crowley's quote highlights the dual nature of magick, describing it as both a scientific discipline and an artistic practice. It implies that magick is not merely about supernatural forces; instead, it is a deliberate and conscious effort to create change in one's environment or life according to one's intentions. Crowley emphasizes the importance of willpower in this process, indicating that individuals have the capability to shape their reality through focused intent and informed actions.
In practice
In a workshop on personal empowerment, one could refer to this quote to illustrate the power of intention.
People think that talking is a sign of thinking. It isn't, for the most part' on the contrary, it's a mechanical dodge of the body to relieve oneself of the strain of thinking, just as exercising the muscles helps the body to become temporarily unconscious of its weight, its pain, its weariness, and the foreknowledge of its doom.
There is a single main definition of the object of all magical Ritual. It is the uniting of the Microcosm with the Macrocosm. The Supreme and Complete Ritual is therefore the Invocation of the Holy Guardian Angel; or, in the language of Mysticism, Union with God.
I was not content to believe in a personal devil and serve him, in the ordinary sense of the word. I wanted to get hold of him personally and become his chief of staff.
Magick is the Science of understanding oneself and one's conditions. It is the Art of applying that understanding in action.
I do not want to father a flock, to be the fetish of fools and fanatics or the founder of a faith whose followers are content to echo my opinions. I want each man to cut his own way through the jungle.
It will be seen that the formula - 'Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law' has nothing to do with 'Do as you please.' It is much more difficult to comply with the Law of Thelema than to follow out slavishly a set of dead regulations.
If you fight sex, sex becomes the center. Then, continuously, you are engaged in it, occupied with it. It becomes like a wound. And wherever you look, that wound immediately projects, and whatsoever you see becomes sexual.
Life is simply the reification of the process of living.
The fire was silent, the little houses collapsing into the flames without complaint, flocks of sparks rising to the sky. At a distance it seemed beautiful, and I thought it was strange that powerful violence is often so pleasing to the eye.
In violence there is often the quality of yearning - the yearning for completion. For closure. For that which is absent and would if present bring to fulfillment. For the body without which the wing is a useless frozen ornament. ("A Short Guide To The City")
Western dictionaries define secularism as absence of religion but Indian secularism does not mean irreligiousness.It means profusion of religions.
I will call not just on Israel, but on the Palestinians, on the Arab States, and the international community to join us in this effort, because the burden of making hard choices must not be Israelβs alone.
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