Page:The Law of Liberty.djvu/3

 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."

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 Himself: "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 itself—Be strong, 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 development of the soul through joy.

Here is the Calendar of our Church: "But ye, O my people, rise up and awake! Let the rituals be rightly performed with joy and beauty!" Remember that all acts of love and pleasure are rituals, must be rituals. "There are rituals of the elements and feasts of the