Natural Magick (1584)
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Natural Magick (1584)
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Re: Natural Magick (1584)
#2What is a good definition of magic? Does magic necessarily NOT exist by definition, or do many/most/all forms of it not exist due to empirical results? Does magic that works become science?
Re: Natural Magick (1584)
#3A modern version of this should be written in this exact style:
"On the generation of diverse animals and plants through descent with modification..."
"Of the refinement of the silicate ores and the arrangement of circuits thereon..."
"Of the splitting of the atomes to obtaineth warmth, light, and terrible destructive forces whose mere possession shall discourage all enemies from waging war upon thee..."
Re: Natural Magick (1584)
#4What is a good definition of magic? Does magic necessarily NOT exist by definition, or do many/most/all forms of it not exist due to empirical results? Does magic that works become science?
"So then Magick is taken amongst all men for wisdom, and the perfect knowledge of natural things: and those are called Magicians, whom the Latin's call Wisemen, the Greeks call Philosophers ... The Egyptians call them priests; and the Cabalists call them prophets. And so in diverse countries Magick has diverse names." (From chapter I)
So it seems in this book it is basically knowledge about the world, with no particular distinction been "natural" and "supernatural".
Re: Natural Magick (1584)
#5What is a good definition of magic? Does magic necessarily NOT exist by definition, or do many/most/all forms of it not exist due to empirical results? Does magic that works become science?
Or psychotherapy. For some reason, a LOT of people that I've known to eventually to go become therapists, first have dabbled in tarot, runes and other magical divination. And since their intention was honest intent to help people and they were intelligent enough, progression to moden therapy seemed very appropriate.
Re: Natural Magick (1584)
#6What is a good definition of magic? Does magic necessarily NOT exist by definition, or do many/most/all forms of it not exist due to empirical results? Does magic that works become science?
"So then Magick is taken amongst all men for wisdom, and the perfect knowledge of natural things: and those are called Magicians, whom the Latin's call Wisemen, the Greeks call Philosophers ... The Egyptians call them priests; and the Cabalists call them prophets. And so in diverse countries Magick has diverse names." (From chapter I) So it seems in this book it is basically knowledge about the world, with no particu…
>There are two sorts of Magick; the one is infamous, and unhappy, because it has to do with foul Spirits, and consists of incantations and wicked curiosity; and this is called Sorcery; an art which all learned and good men detest; neither is it able to yield an truth of reason or nature, but stands merely upon fancies and imaginations, such as vanish presently away, and leave nothing behind them; as Jamblicus writes in his book concerning the mysteries of the Egyptians. The other Magick is natural; which all excellent wise men do admit and embrace, and worship with great applause; neither is there any thing more highly esteemed, or better thought of, by men of learning. The most noble Philosophers that ever were, Pythagorus, Empedocles, Democritus, and Plato, forsook their own countries, and lived abroad as exiles and banished men, rather than as strangers; and all to search out and to attain this knowledge; and when they came home again, this was the Science which they professed, and this they esteemed a profound mystery.
Science Magick is arcane, requiring math skills and experimenation, rational and ordered
Sorcery is fel, dealing in raging infernals and sexy succubi from the Twisting Nether, emotive and chaotic
Re: Natural Magick (1584)
#7What is a good definition of magic? Does magic necessarily NOT exist by definition, or do many/most/all forms of it not exist due to empirical results? Does magic that works become science?
I'd define it as the nonphysical controlling the physical. Math is one obvious example of such magic.
Hence why Bacon, who originated modern science by rejecting teleology and promoting math, was an occultist.
Re: Natural Magick (1584)
#8It's slightly shocking to read this and realize how many outright falsehoods these people were being told. It's almost wonderful that knowledge advanced when people were being taught stuff like this by authorities ancient and modern:
> Diodorus says, that near to the city Thebais in Egypt, when Nilus overflowing is past, the Sun heating the wet ground, the chaps of the earth send forth great store of Mice in many places, which astonishes men to see, that the fore-part of the mice should live and be moved, whereas their hinder parts are not yet shaped. Pliny says, that after the swaging of Nilus, there are found little Mice begun to be made of earth and water, their fore-parts living, and their hinder parts being nothing but earth.
Re: Natural Magick (1584)
#9What is a good definition of magic? Does magic necessarily NOT exist by definition, or do many/most/all forms of it not exist due to empirical results? Does magic that works become science?
Or psychotherapy. For some reason, a LOT of people that I've known to eventually to go become therapists, first have dabbled in tarot, runes and other magical divination. And since their intention was honest intent to help people and they were intelligent enough, progression to moden therapy seemed very appropriate.
The symbols with which our minds reason about our circumstances are truly interesting. Makes sense that people are trying to "see behind the veil" and tease out what those symbols effect.
Re: Natural Magick (1584)
#10What is a good definition of magic? Does magic necessarily NOT exist by definition, or do many/most/all forms of it not exist due to empirical results? Does magic that works become science?
I'd define it as the nonphysical controlling the physical. Math is one obvious example of such magic. Hence why Bacon, who originated modern science by rejecting teleology and promoting math, was an occultist.
Math is an invented tool. It controls nothing.