Attainment Through Magic: Evoking the Higher Self

by William G. Gray

Book by William G. Gray

308 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 1979

About the author

English ceremonial magician (1913-1992)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_...

William G. Gray, better known to many as Bill Gray, was an English ceremonial magician, Hermetic Qabalist and writer, who published widely on the subject of western esotericism and the occult. Gray founded a magical order known as the Sangreal Sodality.

Librarian note:
There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name

Reviews

[Taylor Ellwood · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of Gray's most intriguing books, wherein he lays down a lot of ideas about magic, introduces you to some amazing techniques and shows you what it is like to truly live your magic. It's a work of genius and if you're serious about your magic, you should read this book. Multiple times. It'll challenge you and help you grow in your spiritual practice.

[William Alan · Rating 5 out of 5]

William G. Gray treats the Higher Self less like a celestial pen pal and more like a problem of architecture: if human consciousness has greater rooms available to it, magic is the business of finding the stairs. Attainment Through Magic explores ritual, symbolism, polarity, consciousness, inner contact, and the gradual alignment of the ordinary personality with something larger and considerably wiser. Gray can be dense, eccentric, and wonderfully uncompromising, but there is real substance beneath the thicket of terminology. He expects magic to transform the magician rather than merely improve the magician’s circumstances, and that distinction gives the book its weight. The promised attainment never feels like a medal pinned on at the end; it is more like discovering who has been quietly looking through your eyes all along.

[Lewis]

I found this amongst a whole stash of mysticism books at Goodwill. I figured the previous owner either chose a different path, or else they achieved enlightenment and didn't need the manuals anymore. Magic(k) has always seemed too D&D to me, but this book looks like it puts things in pretty reasonable terms and makes sense.