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Hermes' Portal
Issue #6
Hermes' Portal
Issue n° 6
November 2002
by Adam Bank and Jeremiah Genest
by David Woods
by Mark Shirley
nd
by Sheila Thomas
by Andrew Gronosky
by Jérôme Darmont
by Mike Sloothaak
by Eric Minton
by Michaël de Verteuil
hermes' portal
Publisher: Hermes’ Portal
Layout: Eric Kouris
Contributors: Abelard, Adam Bank, David Chart, Jérôme Darmont, Jeremiah Genest, Andrew Gronosky, Eric Minton, Mark Shirley,
Sheila Thomas, Mike Sloothaak, Michaël de Verteuil, David Woods
Editorial and proofreading help: Sheila Thomas
Cover, border, back and page numbering: Radja Sauperamaniane
Interior illustrations: Angela Taylor (p. 31, 37, 38, 45), Alexander White (p. 4, 8, 10, 14, 24, 28, 29, 35, 47), Radja Sauperamaniane (p. 3,
33, 40, 50, 51)
Thanks
: All the people who submitted ideas, texts, illustrations or helped in the production of this issue.
Hermes’ Portal is an independent publication dedicated to Ars Magica players. Hermes’ Portal is available through email only.
Hermes’ Portal
is not affiliated with Atlas Games or White Wolf Gaming Studio. References to trademarks of those companies are not
intended to infringe upon the rights of those parties. Ars Magica was created by Jonathan Tweet and Mark Rhein Hagen.
Hermes’ Portal # 6, Copyright ©2002, Hermes’ Portal. All rights reserved. Reproduction of this work is allowed for personal use only.
Contacting HP
Email
Hermes.Portal@wanadoo.fr
Web site
www.hermesportal.fr.st
News from
the Line Editor
October 2002
released after all the currently announced books, and
after some others at earlier stages of development.
I have two goals for a fifth edition. The first is to
fix known problems with the rules, both broken rules
and the ambiguities that cause so many mailing list
debates. Thus, combat will be revised and better
guidance provided on the way in which magic resist-
ance works.
The second is to make Ars Magica more acces-
sible. I would like someone to be able to play the
game within hours of seeing the rulebook for the
first time, without any assistance from experienced
players. This will require the more substantial
changes. Some changes will have to be made to the
rules, but most changes will be in presentation. How
do you play Ars Magica? What makes a good magus
character? What can you do with magic? And so on.
A second aspect of this is that I want the new
edition to better support single session games. Role-
players are often willing to try a single session of
something new, even if they are involved in another
campaign, because it gives the GM a break. A whole
new saga, however, is a much harder sell. Because
Ars Magica is such a good game, people who play a
single session will, of course, want to play a saga, and
so the game’s fanbase will grow.
We are considering issuing ArM5 in two volumes
simply because all the material needed to fulfil those
two aims is unlikely to fit in a single volume at a rea-
sonable price. While subscribers to Hermes’ Portal
might be willing to pay $60 for fifth edition, such a
price point would most likely prevent us from gain-
ing new players.
Finally, my favourite colour is midnight blue, and
I don’t have a favourite pair of socks.
Further questions that people would like to see
answered in this column should be sent to me at:
arsmagica@dchart.demon.co.uk
with a note that you would like me to answer
them here.
N
iall Christie’s excellent Blood and Sand: The
Levant Tribunal started appearing in better
game shops shortly before I wrote this. I
think the new hardback format looks
great, and this book should mark the beginning of a
new period of roughly quarterly releases for Ars
Magica. It is also the first book I have developed for
the line, so let me know what you think of it.
For future releases, The Black Monks of Glastonbury
is on schedule for a January/February release. Sanctu-
ary of Ice is still making progress through editing, but
I am not going to say anything more about that book
until we have the final draft in hand.
Living Legends is currently in final edit, and so
should be out some time around June next year.
Between Black Monks and Living Legends we should
see the release of Land of Fire and Ice by David
Woods and Mark Shirley.
Land of Fire and Ice provides setting details for
Iceland, and two epic saga arcs to get magi involved
with that spectacular land. It also includes rules for
various kinds of Icelandic hedge magician. In Ice-
land, the magical is closely involved in mundane life,
and magicians have their own place in the social sys-
tem. Meanwhile, the icy and volcanic wastes are the
domain of giants, trolls, and powerful spirits. I am
most of the way through the final edit of the book,
so it will probably be released around March 2003.
However, we don’t have final, edited drafts of Land
of Fire and Ice or Living Legends yet, so these are not
official release dates. Indeed, Black Monks hasn’t been
officially announced yet.
Questions
Alex White emailed me with some questions for
this column. As I believe this is the first time that any
Line Editor has received questions for his zine col-
umn, I feel I ought to answer them.
In the last issue of Hermes Portal you said that
you’d answer questions etc.
So, for HP6, I was wondering if you’d give us
some information on what the thought
processes are behind the possible Ars Magica
5th edition. If you’ve got no concrete info,
then tell us, and if the decision has been made
to make it 2 books, then tell us. :-)
Also the status of Sanctuary of Ice and Black
Monks. Additionally, I’d like to know your
favourite colour and whether you have a
favourite pair of socks (humour me, please?).
I’ve dealt with Sanctuary of Ice and Black Monks,so
I suppose I should say a bit about the fifth edition.
There will be a fifth edition, and most likely sooner
rather than later, although it will, of course, be
3
Books
The Miraculous World
by Adam Bank and Jeremiah Genest
The Lyceum widely circulates The Miraculous
World a tractatus advertising the Lyceum’s theories
of magic and the cosmos. Written as a lecture of a
master to apprentice, The Miraculous Word purports
to explain the Limits of Magic.
In the Beginning
“Tell me, pater, how did the limits of magic come
into being?”
God created the universe. To doubt this turns the
discussion from science and magic to the domain of
theology, and that argument must await another day.
What you have asked me, although you may not real-
ize it, is how God set about the difficult task of cre-
ating the world. How did he bring forth plants and
animals from the lifeless elements? How were the
heavens divided into stars, orbs and intelligences?
What forces and connections did He establish
between the heavenly and earthly realms so that the
chain of events ran smoothly? What dispositions
originally given to the universe provide for all that
was to follow?
Ex Nihilo
The creation of the universe ex nihilo, the cre-
ation of all things from nothing, lasted six days.
Everything created during those blessed days shares
one obvious commonality — they exist. Whatever
thing, whether man or beast, mind or matter, shares
some property that sets it apart from nothing, what
we call being. Before we examine objects created in
those the six days, therefore, we must understand
being as being, or how God created existence itself.
For this, we turn to the metaphysics of Aristotle.
Matter
Matter is the formless raw material of the uni-
verse.
Since nothing exists prior to creation, matter
must come into being ex nihilo. Alternatively, eternal
matter (the hyle) somehow exists apart from God
and cooperated with Him in the creation of the uni-
verse. Along with the overwhelming majority of
authorities on the subject, we reject this notion. How
can something exist before it is created? The very
words are absurd.
For m
Form is the outline and design of what some-
thing (namely matter) will become.
In the beginning God brought form to the uni-
verse. Forms possess the capacity to shape matter,
but until form is introduced to matter, form belongs
to nothing, rather than being. Creation ex nihilo,
therefore, is the process by which the form of the
universe transferred from the mind of God to the
realm of being.
Matter and Form
God brought forth the universe threefold, as mat-
ter, substantial form, and accidents. Matter underlies
the universe and serves as a passive medium for the
ordering activity of forms. Substantial forms trans-
form undefined matter into particular things through
the process of information. Accidents give (or, more
T
he Lyceum consists of a half-dozen Bon-
isagus magi, each at least several decades
out of apprenticeship, and the “visiting”
Jerbiton or Verditius drawn to their
cause.
4
The Lyceum, named after the legendary school
founded by Aristotle, functions both as a covenant
and secret society. The Lyceum covenant nestles on
the Italian coast near Pisa. As a secret society, the
Lyceum recruits members through the time-honored
tradition of House Bonisagus — taking apprentices
from other magi. In recent decades, the Lyceum vis-
ited covenants in all Tribunals, investigating possible
talent for their projects.
The members of the Lyceum are dedicated Aris-
totelians. They believe Bonisagus, a brilliant Aris-
totelian mind, was lead astray by the mysticism of the
other Founders, especially Diedne, whose non-Aris-
totelian theories corrupted Hermetic magic with
false species and categories. To this end, the Lyceum
studies the sympathies between the Hermetic Arts
and Aristotle’s physics. As their ultimate goal, they
hope to discover how to manipulate light with the
Form of Vim. Aristotle, Ptolemy, and countless oth-
er philosophers observed that light is the force of
magic and change. The Lyceum searches for a
method of uniting the Order’s notion of aether and
vis with lux and lumen, expecting everything else to
fall into place once the key breakthrough is made.
Many Bonisagus magi scoff at this notion, saying
the Lyceum takes certain philosophical questions too
far and abuses the privileges of their House. The first
few, newly gauntleted magi to come from the Acad-
emy, however, are some of the most promising ele-
mentalists in centuries.
Virtues Taught: Hermetic Alchemy (+1), Her-
metic Astrology (+1), Vulgar Alchemy (+2), Affinity
with Aquam (+3), Affinity with Auram (+3), Affini-
ty with Ignem (+3), Affinity with Vim (+3).
Lyceum for Empirical Metaphysics
properly, “inform”) particular things their particular
characteristics.
For example, a magus’ canine familiar may pos-
sess the accidents of fat or thin, golden or dun, dis-
temperate or vibrant, but it still possesses the sub-
stantial form that permits anyone to identify it as a
dog. While the stout mastiff shares little accidental
likeness with the courtly pug, both these furry
objects are informed with the substantial forms that
make up “dogness.”
Matter, it may surprise you to know, cannot be
perceived, or even known. Perception and knowl-
edge of the human mind is limited to accidents, the
particulars of life. Substantial form can only be indi-
rectly experienced or understood through philoso-
phy and magic. Magic lifts the cloud of accidents and
reveals the truth underneath.
He populated the world with beings and things,
for this was the best course of action. He created the
world in six days, in a series of orderly steps, because
this was best. He established the laws and order of
nature because this was best. Of course, God and his
agents can, and occasionally do, transcend the natu-
ral order and suspend those laws. But these excep-
tions prove the rule: miracles, by their nature and
definition, are so rare as to be beyond the scope of
mortal learning.
Why the Limits Exist
What does this tell us? Magic, even the great
spells of the Order, is not miraculous. Magic can be
worked by a precious few Gifted mortal minds. It
follows that magic is natural, and obeys the laws and
order of God. A magic spell, like any natural process,
can only act on the combination of matter and form,
not on matter or form by itself.
For this reason alone, the limits of magic exist.
Rational Creatures
Amorphous Morass
Pe Im 30
R: Per D: Conc T: Sight
Requisite: Quartz (+1)
As long as the caster concentrates, the accidents
of all objects within sight are separated from their
substantial form. The result is a giant amorphous
zone of incomprehensible sensory experience. The
chaos assaults all five senses. Nothing makes sense,
even the victim’s own thoughts and screams. Each
round, everyone within the zone (including the
caster) must make Sta + Concentration roll of 12+
or fall into a conniption and lose a Fatigue level. If
the caster fails this roll, the spell ends. If the ypu
use a Rego casting requisite, however, you are not
affected yourself.
This spell is often used to torment members of
secret societies during initiation ordeals.
“Heavens refer not so much to the visible fir-
mament as the empyrean, which is immediately
filled with angels.”
Walafrid Strabo, Glossa Ordinaria
Between God, who exists neither as matter nor
form, and the creatures of the Earth, who live both
as matter and form, dwell beings existing only of
form. They are the creature rationales, incorporeal
entities created by God solely for their incredible
capacity of thought. They are the angels, demons,
and movers of the planets, called the intelligences.
Because they exist only as forms, the rational
creatures were not created during the first six days,
but before them. They existed prior to matter, as
forms or ideas in the mind of God. While the earth
and all its occupants transferred from the mind of
God to creation ex nihilo, the angels, demons, and
intelligences have always remained in principii. In
other words, the rational creatures existed “in the
beginning” whilst the universe awaited creation dur-
ing the first week.
The Limit of the Divine
These are but illustrations to bolster a central
point: all those things that remain in principii cannot
be affected by magic. Magic, as a natural force, can
only influence material created ex nihilo, those things
which were created during the first six days.
Angels and most aspects of the Divine made
manifest on Earth are immune from magic. Demons,
fortunately, chose to corrupt themselves with matter,
allowing magic some defense against them. But as to
their purpose in the universe, as the source of falsity,
demons remain in principii, making demonic decep-
tion as immune as angelic intervention.
The Limit of the Soul
The human soul takes on its purest form before
birth and regains it after death. In the state of pre-life
and afterlife, souls exist free from any matter. The
soul, in other words, is the substantial form of the
In Principio
To understand creation, we must first attempt the
understanding of the Creator, and the state of in
principio — the state of inception. We must try to
see into the mind of God when He chose to create
the universe.
The Creative Act
God in His omnipotence could have created the
universe as whatever or in any way He desired.
Because all possibilities were open to Him, He could
have created a million worlds, leaving us to forever
wonder whether our world had any importance at all.
He could have created a universe devoid of natural
law, operated by Divine will alone. Happily, as the
philosophers have shown, He did not.
Though omnipotent, God does not deny the nat-
ural order. Creation should not be thought of as an
instantaneous, all-powerful act, but the product of a
rational, chosen, willful course of action. In princi-
pio, God chose the things that inhabit the universe,
plucked them from the infinite possibilities available
to Him. In His wisdom He knew not to create one
infinite world, or many finite worlds, but one, best
finite world.
5
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Hermes' Portal
Issue #6
Hermes' Portal
Issue n° 6
November 2002
by Adam Bank and Jeremiah Genest
by David Woods
by Mark Shirley
nd
by Sheila Thomas
by Andrew Gronosky
by Jérôme Darmont
by Mike Sloothaak
by Eric Minton
by Michaël de Verteuil
hermes' portal
Publisher: Hermes’ Portal
Layout: Eric Kouris
Contributors: Abelard, Adam Bank, David Chart, Jérôme Darmont, Jeremiah Genest, Andrew Gronosky, Eric Minton, Mark Shirley,
Sheila Thomas, Mike Sloothaak, Michaël de Verteuil, David Woods
Editorial and proofreading help: Sheila Thomas
Cover, border, back and page numbering: Radja Sauperamaniane
Interior illustrations: Angela Taylor (p. 31, 37, 38, 45), Alexander White (p. 4, 8, 10, 14, 24, 28, 29, 35, 47), Radja Sauperamaniane (p. 3,
33, 40, 50, 51)
Thanks
: All the people who submitted ideas, texts, illustrations or helped in the production of this issue.
Hermes’ Portal is an independent publication dedicated to Ars Magica players. Hermes’ Portal is available through email only.
Hermes’ Portal
is not affiliated with Atlas Games or White Wolf Gaming Studio. References to trademarks of those companies are not
intended to infringe upon the rights of those parties. Ars Magica was created by Jonathan Tweet and Mark Rhein Hagen.
Hermes’ Portal # 6, Copyright ©2002, Hermes’ Portal. All rights reserved. Reproduction of this work is allowed for personal use only.
Contacting HP
Hermes.Portal@wanadoo.fr
Web site
www.hermesportal.fr.st
News from
the Line Editor
October 2002
released after all the currently announced books, and
after some others at earlier stages of development.
I have two goals for a fifth edition. The first is to
fix known problems with the rules, both broken rules
and the ambiguities that cause so many mailing list
debates. Thus, combat will be revised and better
guidance provided on the way in which magic resist-
ance works.
The second is to make Ars Magica more acces-
sible. I would like someone to be able to play the
game within hours of seeing the rulebook for the
first time, without any assistance from experienced
players. This will require the more substantial
changes. Some changes will have to be made to the
rules, but most changes will be in presentation. How
do you play Ars Magica? What makes a good magus
character? What can you do with magic? And so on.
A second aspect of this is that I want the new
edition to better support single session games. Role-
players are often willing to try a single session of
something new, even if they are involved in another
campaign, because it gives the GM a break. A whole
new saga, however, is a much harder sell. Because
Ars Magica is such a good game, people who play a
single session will, of course, want to play a saga, and
so the game’s fanbase will grow.
We are considering issuing ArM5 in two volumes
simply because all the material needed to fulfil those
two aims is unlikely to fit in a single volume at a rea-
sonable price. While subscribers to Hermes’ Portal
might be willing to pay $60 for fifth edition, such a
price point would most likely prevent us from gain-
ing new players.
Finally, my favourite colour is midnight blue, and
I don’t have a favourite pair of socks.
Further questions that people would like to see
answered in this column should be sent to me at:
arsmagica@dchart.demon.co.uk
with a note that you would like me to answer
them here.
N
iall Christie’s excellent Blood and Sand: The
Levant Tribunal started appearing in better
game shops shortly before I wrote this. I
think the new hardback format looks
great, and this book should mark the beginning of a
new period of roughly quarterly releases for Ars
Magica. It is also the first book I have developed for
the line, so let me know what you think of it.
For future releases, The Black Monks of Glastonbury
is on schedule for a January/February release. Sanctu-
ary of Ice is still making progress through editing, but
I am not going to say anything more about that book
until we have the final draft in hand.
Living Legends is currently in final edit, and so
should be out some time around June next year.
Between Black Monks and Living Legends we should
see the release of Land of Fire and Ice by David
Woods and Mark Shirley.
Land of Fire and Ice provides setting details for
Iceland, and two epic saga arcs to get magi involved
with that spectacular land. It also includes rules for
various kinds of Icelandic hedge magician. In Ice-
land, the magical is closely involved in mundane life,
and magicians have their own place in the social sys-
tem. Meanwhile, the icy and volcanic wastes are the
domain of giants, trolls, and powerful spirits. I am
most of the way through the final edit of the book,
so it will probably be released around March 2003.
However, we don’t have final, edited drafts of Land
of Fire and Ice or Living Legends yet, so these are not
official release dates. Indeed, Black Monks hasn’t been
officially announced yet.
Questions
Alex White emailed me with some questions for
this column. As I believe this is the first time that any
Line Editor has received questions for his zine col-
umn, I feel I ought to answer them.
In the last issue of Hermes Portal you said that
you’d answer questions etc.
So, for HP6, I was wondering if you’d give us
some information on what the thought
processes are behind the possible Ars Magica
5th edition. If you’ve got no concrete info,
then tell us, and if the decision has been made
to make it 2 books, then tell us. :-)
Also the status of Sanctuary of Ice and Black
Monks. Additionally, I’d like to know your
favourite colour and whether you have a
favourite pair of socks (humour me, please?).
I’ve dealt with Sanctuary of Ice and Black Monks,so
I suppose I should say a bit about the fifth edition.
There will be a fifth edition, and most likely sooner
rather than later, although it will, of course, be
3
Books
The Miraculous World
by Adam Bank and Jeremiah Genest
The Lyceum widely circulates The Miraculous
World a tractatus advertising the Lyceum’s theories
of magic and the cosmos. Written as a lecture of a
master to apprentice, The Miraculous Word purports
to explain the Limits of Magic.
In the Beginning
“Tell me, pater, how did the limits of magic come
into being?”
God created the universe. To doubt this turns the
discussion from science and magic to the domain of
theology, and that argument must await another day.
What you have asked me, although you may not real-
ize it, is how God set about the difficult task of cre-
ating the world. How did he bring forth plants and
animals from the lifeless elements? How were the
heavens divided into stars, orbs and intelligences?
What forces and connections did He establish
between the heavenly and earthly realms so that the
chain of events ran smoothly? What dispositions
originally given to the universe provide for all that
was to follow?
Ex Nihilo
The creation of the universe ex nihilo, the cre-
ation of all things from nothing, lasted six days.
Everything created during those blessed days shares
one obvious commonality — they exist. Whatever
thing, whether man or beast, mind or matter, shares
some property that sets it apart from nothing, what
we call being. Before we examine objects created in
those the six days, therefore, we must understand
being as being, or how God created existence itself.
For this, we turn to the metaphysics of Aristotle.
Matter
Matter is the formless raw material of the uni-
verse.
Since nothing exists prior to creation, matter
must come into being ex nihilo. Alternatively, eternal
matter (the hyle) somehow exists apart from God
and cooperated with Him in the creation of the uni-
verse. Along with the overwhelming majority of
authorities on the subject, we reject this notion. How
can something exist before it is created? The very
words are absurd.
For m
Form is the outline and design of what some-
thing (namely matter) will become.
In the beginning God brought form to the uni-
verse. Forms possess the capacity to shape matter,
but until form is introduced to matter, form belongs
to nothing, rather than being. Creation ex nihilo,
therefore, is the process by which the form of the
universe transferred from the mind of God to the
realm of being.
Matter and Form
God brought forth the universe threefold, as mat-
ter, substantial form, and accidents. Matter underlies
the universe and serves as a passive medium for the
ordering activity of forms. Substantial forms trans-
form undefined matter into particular things through
the process of information. Accidents give (or, more
T
he Lyceum consists of a half-dozen Bon-
isagus magi, each at least several decades
out of apprenticeship, and the “visiting”
Jerbiton or Verditius drawn to their
cause.
4
The Lyceum, named after the legendary school
founded by Aristotle, functions both as a covenant
and secret society. The Lyceum covenant nestles on
the Italian coast near Pisa. As a secret society, the
Lyceum recruits members through the time-honored
tradition of House Bonisagus — taking apprentices
from other magi. In recent decades, the Lyceum vis-
ited covenants in all Tribunals, investigating possible
talent for their projects.
The members of the Lyceum are dedicated Aris-
totelians. They believe Bonisagus, a brilliant Aris-
totelian mind, was lead astray by the mysticism of the
other Founders, especially Diedne, whose non-Aris-
totelian theories corrupted Hermetic magic with
false species and categories. To this end, the Lyceum
studies the sympathies between the Hermetic Arts
and Aristotle’s physics. As their ultimate goal, they
hope to discover how to manipulate light with the
Form of Vim. Aristotle, Ptolemy, and countless oth-
er philosophers observed that light is the force of
magic and change. The Lyceum searches for a
method of uniting the Order’s notion of aether and
vis with lux and lumen, expecting everything else to
fall into place once the key breakthrough is made.
Many Bonisagus magi scoff at this notion, saying
the Lyceum takes certain philosophical questions too
far and abuses the privileges of their House. The first
few, newly gauntleted magi to come from the Acad-
emy, however, are some of the most promising ele-
mentalists in centuries.
Virtues Taught: Hermetic Alchemy (+1), Her-
metic Astrology (+1), Vulgar Alchemy (+2), Affinity
with Aquam (+3), Affinity with Auram (+3), Affini-
ty with Ignem (+3), Affinity with Vim (+3).
Lyceum for Empirical Metaphysics
properly, “inform”) particular things their particular
characteristics.
For example, a magus’ canine familiar may pos-
sess the accidents of fat or thin, golden or dun, dis-
temperate or vibrant, but it still possesses the sub-
stantial form that permits anyone to identify it as a
dog. While the stout mastiff shares little accidental
likeness with the courtly pug, both these furry
objects are informed with the substantial forms that
make up “dogness.”
Matter, it may surprise you to know, cannot be
perceived, or even known. Perception and knowl-
edge of the human mind is limited to accidents, the
particulars of life. Substantial form can only be indi-
rectly experienced or understood through philoso-
phy and magic. Magic lifts the cloud of accidents and
reveals the truth underneath.
He populated the world with beings and things,
for this was the best course of action. He created the
world in six days, in a series of orderly steps, because
this was best. He established the laws and order of
nature because this was best. Of course, God and his
agents can, and occasionally do, transcend the natu-
ral order and suspend those laws. But these excep-
tions prove the rule: miracles, by their nature and
definition, are so rare as to be beyond the scope of
mortal learning.
Why the Limits Exist
What does this tell us? Magic, even the great
spells of the Order, is not miraculous. Magic can be
worked by a precious few Gifted mortal minds. It
follows that magic is natural, and obeys the laws and
order of God. A magic spell, like any natural process,
can only act on the combination of matter and form,
not on matter or form by itself.
For this reason alone, the limits of magic exist.
Rational Creatures
Amorphous Morass
Pe Im 30
R: Per D: Conc T: Sight
Requisite: Quartz (+1)
As long as the caster concentrates, the accidents
of all objects within sight are separated from their
substantial form. The result is a giant amorphous
zone of incomprehensible sensory experience. The
chaos assaults all five senses. Nothing makes sense,
even the victim’s own thoughts and screams. Each
round, everyone within the zone (including the
caster) must make Sta + Concentration roll of 12+
or fall into a conniption and lose a Fatigue level. If
the caster fails this roll, the spell ends. If the ypu
use a Rego casting requisite, however, you are not
affected yourself.
This spell is often used to torment members of
secret societies during initiation ordeals.
“Heavens refer not so much to the visible fir-
mament as the empyrean, which is immediately
filled with angels.”
Walafrid Strabo, Glossa Ordinaria
Between God, who exists neither as matter nor
form, and the creatures of the Earth, who live both
as matter and form, dwell beings existing only of
form. They are the creature rationales, incorporeal
entities created by God solely for their incredible
capacity of thought. They are the angels, demons,
and movers of the planets, called the intelligences.
Because they exist only as forms, the rational
creatures were not created during the first six days,
but before them. They existed prior to matter, as
forms or ideas in the mind of God. While the earth
and all its occupants transferred from the mind of
God to creation ex nihilo, the angels, demons, and
intelligences have always remained in principii. In
other words, the rational creatures existed “in the
beginning” whilst the universe awaited creation dur-
ing the first week.
The Limit of the Divine
These are but illustrations to bolster a central
point: all those things that remain in principii cannot
be affected by magic. Magic, as a natural force, can
only influence material created ex nihilo, those things
which were created during the first six days.
Angels and most aspects of the Divine made
manifest on Earth are immune from magic. Demons,
fortunately, chose to corrupt themselves with matter,
allowing magic some defense against them. But as to
their purpose in the universe, as the source of falsity,
demons remain in principii, making demonic decep-
tion as immune as angelic intervention.
The Limit of the Soul
The human soul takes on its purest form before
birth and regains it after death. In the state of pre-life
and afterlife, souls exist free from any matter. The
soul, in other words, is the substantial form of the
In Principio
To understand creation, we must first attempt the
understanding of the Creator, and the state of in
principio — the state of inception. We must try to
see into the mind of God when He chose to create
the universe.
The Creative Act
God in His omnipotence could have created the
universe as whatever or in any way He desired.
Because all possibilities were open to Him, He could
have created a million worlds, leaving us to forever
wonder whether our world had any importance at all.
He could have created a universe devoid of natural
law, operated by Divine will alone. Happily, as the
philosophers have shown, He did not.
Though omnipotent, God does not deny the nat-
ural order. Creation should not be thought of as an
instantaneous, all-powerful act, but the product of a
rational, chosen, willful course of action. In princi-
pio, God chose the things that inhabit the universe,
plucked them from the infinite possibilities available
to Him. In His wisdom He knew not to create one
infinite world, or many finite worlds, but one, best
finite world.
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