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The Great Secret
The Great Secret is a book written by Eliphas Levi, a French occultist and author. The book is a collection of essays and lectures on various topics related to occultism, mysticism, and esotericism. The Great Secret is divided into two the first part discusses the principles of occultism, while the second part delves into the practices of occultism.In the first part of the book, Levi discusses the principles of the occult sciences, including the nature of the universe, the laws of nature, and the principles of magic. He also explores the relationship between the physical world and the spiritual world, and how these two worlds are interconnected.The second part of the book focuses on the practices of occultism, including the use of symbols, rituals, and invocations to connect with the spiritual realm. Levi explains how to use these practices to tap into the hidden powers of the universe and to achieve spiritual enlightenment.Overall, The Great Secret is a comprehensive guide to the principles and practices of occultism. It is a must-read for anyone interested in the occult sciences, mysticism, and esotericism.THIS 20 PAGE ARTICLE WAS EXTRACTED FROM THE Paradoxes of the Highest Science, by Eliphas Levi. To purchase the entire book, please order ISBN 1564590208.This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the old original and may contain some imperfections such as library marks and notations. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions, that are true to their original work.
48 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1868
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About the author
Éliphas Lévi
545 books301 followersÉliphas Lévi is the pen-name of Abbé Alphonse Louis Constant, a Roman Catholic priest and magician. His later writings on the Tarot and occult topics were a great influence on the Spiritualist and Hermetic movements of fin de siècle England and France, especially on such members of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn as Arthur Edward Waite and Aleister Crowley.
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Éliphas Lévi es el nombre adoptado por el mago y escritor ocultista francés Alphonse Louis Constant.
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Éliphas Lévi es el nombre adoptado por el mago y escritor ocultista francés Alphonse Louis Constant.
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
February 24, 2023
As a book of occult philosophy, this is no doubt a useful historical text. Some of it resonates strongly even today. Other parts however are either outdated or are too sectarian for occultists who are not Christian to embrace. 3.5 stars.
July 16, 2014
From the Great Secret:
The ancient rites have lost their effectiveness since Christianity appeared in the world. The Christian and Catholic religion, in fact, is the legitimate daughter of Jesus, king of the Mages.
A simple scapular worn by a truly Christian person is a more invincible talisman than the ring and pentacle of Solomon.
The Mass is the most prodigious of evocations. Necromancers evoke the dead, the sorcerer evokes the devil and he shakes, but the Catholic Priest does not tremble in evoking the living God.
Catholics alone have Priests because they alone have the altar and the offering, i.e. the whole of religion. To practise high Magic is to compete with the Catholic Priesthood; it is to be a dissident Priest.
Rome is the great Thebes of the new initiation ... It has crypts for its catacombs; for talismen, its rosaries and medallions; for a magic chain, its congregations; for magnetic fires, its convents; for centres of attraction, its confessionals; for means of expansion, its pulpits and the addresses of its Bishops; it has, lastly, its Pope, the Man-God rendered visible.
Here is the penitent Eliphas Levi, whom no one has understood better, it seems to me, than the anonymous author of Meditations on the Tarot. Read Meditations on the Tarot if you wish to comprehend the staggering journey of Eliphas Levi.
My review of Meditations on the Tarot here: http://corjesusacratissimum.org/2009/...
The ancient rites have lost their effectiveness since Christianity appeared in the world. The Christian and Catholic religion, in fact, is the legitimate daughter of Jesus, king of the Mages.
A simple scapular worn by a truly Christian person is a more invincible talisman than the ring and pentacle of Solomon.
The Mass is the most prodigious of evocations. Necromancers evoke the dead, the sorcerer evokes the devil and he shakes, but the Catholic Priest does not tremble in evoking the living God.
Catholics alone have Priests because they alone have the altar and the offering, i.e. the whole of religion. To practise high Magic is to compete with the Catholic Priesthood; it is to be a dissident Priest.
Rome is the great Thebes of the new initiation ... It has crypts for its catacombs; for talismen, its rosaries and medallions; for a magic chain, its congregations; for magnetic fires, its convents; for centres of attraction, its confessionals; for means of expansion, its pulpits and the addresses of its Bishops; it has, lastly, its Pope, the Man-God rendered visible.
Here is the penitent Eliphas Levi, whom no one has understood better, it seems to me, than the anonymous author of Meditations on the Tarot. Read Meditations on the Tarot if you wish to comprehend the staggering journey of Eliphas Levi.
My review of Meditations on the Tarot here: http://corjesusacratissimum.org/2009/...
May 9, 2023
LEVI’S FINAL OCCULTIC BOOK (AND SEQUEL TO ‘THE BOOK OF SPLENDOURS’)
Occultist Eliphas Lévi wrote in the Introduction to this 1868 book, “This work is the author’s testament; it is the most important, and the final, treatise by him on the occult sciences… Here is the last word on occultism and it is written as clearly as it has been possible for us to write it… If real initiates are still to be found somewhere in the world, it is for them we have written it, and to them alone belongs the right to judge us.”
He states, “Evil, in so far as it exists, is the affirmation of disorder. Now in the presence of the eternal order, disorder is essentially transitory. In the presence of the eternal order, which is the will of God, disorder is only relative. Hence the absolute affirmation of disorder and evil is fundamentally a lie. The absolute affirmation of evil is the denial of God, since God is the supreme and absolute source of good.” (Pg. 20)
He says, “True faith cannot possibly come into conflict with true science. Also, every exploration of dogma which science demonstrates as false ought to be rejected by faith… Science and faith are not two engines of war set on a collision course: they are the two columns destined to support the pediment of the temple of peace It is necessary to clean the gold of the sanctuary so often tarnished by the grime of priestcraft.”
(Pg. 35)
He observes, “The great secret of virtue, virtuality and life, whether temporal or eternal, may be formulated thus: The art of balancing forces so as to keep movement in equilibrium. The equilibrium we are looking for is not that which produces immobility, but that which regulates movement., For immobility is death, and movement is life.” (Pg. 38)
He asserts, “black magic is the occult continuation of the proscribed rites of the ancient world. Immolation lies at the bottom of the mysteries of necromancy, and witchcraft with wax figures is equivalent to magical sacrifices where the evil substituted for … the knife. In religion it is faith which saves; in black magic it is faith which kills!” (Pg. 52)
He notes, “Here… is a potent secret which is inaccessible for the majority of people; a secret which they will never guess and which it would be useless to tell them: the secret of their own stupidity.” (Pg. 67)
He suggests, “Evil only gets a grip on us though our vices and through the fear which it inspires us. The Devil hunts down those who are frightened of him, and flees from those who resist him boldly. The art of chaining up demons is to do good and fear nothing. You must not imagine that we are engaged in writing a book of morals. What we are doing is revealing secrets which magical science applies in spiritual healing.” (Pg. 80)
He states, “The whole power of magic is in the central point of the universal equilibrium. The wisdom which strikes this equilibrium is contained in these four dicta: know the truth, will what is good, love beauty, do what is just! Because truth, goodness, beauty and justice are inseparable; so that he who knows the truth must needs will what is good, to love it because it is beautiful and to do it because it is just. The central point in the intellectual and moral order is the link between science and faith. In human nature this central point is the medium in which soul and body combine to establish the identity of their action.” (Pg. 103)
He says, “The reign of God is an admirable form of government, hierarchical in nature, where anarchy is self-destructive. If there are prisons in His empire for guilty sprits, God alone is their Master and makes sure that they are governed by angels who are strict yet good. It is not permitted to the inmates to torture one another. Can we say that God is less wise and good than men are? What, then, can we say of an earthly prince who chose a brigand of the worst sort to be governor of his prisons…” (Pg. 136)
He asserts, “That sublime passage at the beginning of Genesis is not the history of something which only happened once, it is a revelation of the laws of creation and the successive births of Being… The so-called days of Moses are the successive rays of light thrown by the Qabalistic numbers on the grand laws of nature, and the number of days are simply those of revelation.. It begins with the affirmation of the invisible Being and, after the successive contributions of science, it ends in that repose of spirit which is faith.” (Pg. 145)
He wrote, “Those whom initiates are entitled to call profane, the vile multitude, that is to say the feeble masses perverse in mind and heart, those who adore a shadowy god or pay lip service to atheism … always listen without understanding, because they are presumptuous and unreliable. If a doctrine is presented to them in an absurd form to please them, they inevitably understand it in an even more absurd sense and often take it completely the wrong way. Thus, when they repeat mechanically that there is one God in three Persons you will find, if you question them, that for them this means one Person in three Gods.” (Pg. 167)
He contends, “The great arcanum, the inexpressible arcanum, the dangerous arcanum, the incomprehensible arcanum may be definitively formulated thus: The divinity of man. It is inexpressible because as soon as one tries to put it into words it becomes a lie and the most monstrous lie of all. In fact, man is not God. And yet the most audacious, the most obscure and at the same time the most splendid of religions asks us to worship the man-God… theology dares to talk in paradoxes. It speaks of worship addressed to the flesh, the eternity of one who dies, of the impassibility of one who suffers, of the immensity of one who transfigures himself, of the finite taking the virtuality of the infinite, in a word of the God-man who offers to make all men God.” (Pg. 175)
He concludes, “God is light. He does not love darkness. Therefore, if we long to feel God within us, we must let the light into our souls. The tree of Knowledge is not a tree of death except for Satan and his apostles… we shall say, ‘Let us do this because we know that it is good and refrain from doing that because we know that is evil.’ And thus will be realized the promise of the symbolic serpent: ‘You will be as gods, knowing good and evil.’” (Pg. 188)
This book may appeal to those interested in metaphysical/occultic topics.
Occultist Eliphas Lévi wrote in the Introduction to this 1868 book, “This work is the author’s testament; it is the most important, and the final, treatise by him on the occult sciences… Here is the last word on occultism and it is written as clearly as it has been possible for us to write it… If real initiates are still to be found somewhere in the world, it is for them we have written it, and to them alone belongs the right to judge us.”
He states, “Evil, in so far as it exists, is the affirmation of disorder. Now in the presence of the eternal order, disorder is essentially transitory. In the presence of the eternal order, which is the will of God, disorder is only relative. Hence the absolute affirmation of disorder and evil is fundamentally a lie. The absolute affirmation of evil is the denial of God, since God is the supreme and absolute source of good.” (Pg. 20)
He says, “True faith cannot possibly come into conflict with true science. Also, every exploration of dogma which science demonstrates as false ought to be rejected by faith… Science and faith are not two engines of war set on a collision course: they are the two columns destined to support the pediment of the temple of peace It is necessary to clean the gold of the sanctuary so often tarnished by the grime of priestcraft.”
(Pg. 35)
He observes, “The great secret of virtue, virtuality and life, whether temporal or eternal, may be formulated thus: The art of balancing forces so as to keep movement in equilibrium. The equilibrium we are looking for is not that which produces immobility, but that which regulates movement., For immobility is death, and movement is life.” (Pg. 38)
He asserts, “black magic is the occult continuation of the proscribed rites of the ancient world. Immolation lies at the bottom of the mysteries of necromancy, and witchcraft with wax figures is equivalent to magical sacrifices where the evil substituted for … the knife. In religion it is faith which saves; in black magic it is faith which kills!” (Pg. 52)
He notes, “Here… is a potent secret which is inaccessible for the majority of people; a secret which they will never guess and which it would be useless to tell them: the secret of their own stupidity.” (Pg. 67)
He suggests, “Evil only gets a grip on us though our vices and through the fear which it inspires us. The Devil hunts down those who are frightened of him, and flees from those who resist him boldly. The art of chaining up demons is to do good and fear nothing. You must not imagine that we are engaged in writing a book of morals. What we are doing is revealing secrets which magical science applies in spiritual healing.” (Pg. 80)
He states, “The whole power of magic is in the central point of the universal equilibrium. The wisdom which strikes this equilibrium is contained in these four dicta: know the truth, will what is good, love beauty, do what is just! Because truth, goodness, beauty and justice are inseparable; so that he who knows the truth must needs will what is good, to love it because it is beautiful and to do it because it is just. The central point in the intellectual and moral order is the link between science and faith. In human nature this central point is the medium in which soul and body combine to establish the identity of their action.” (Pg. 103)
He says, “The reign of God is an admirable form of government, hierarchical in nature, where anarchy is self-destructive. If there are prisons in His empire for guilty sprits, God alone is their Master and makes sure that they are governed by angels who are strict yet good. It is not permitted to the inmates to torture one another. Can we say that God is less wise and good than men are? What, then, can we say of an earthly prince who chose a brigand of the worst sort to be governor of his prisons…” (Pg. 136)
He asserts, “That sublime passage at the beginning of Genesis is not the history of something which only happened once, it is a revelation of the laws of creation and the successive births of Being… The so-called days of Moses are the successive rays of light thrown by the Qabalistic numbers on the grand laws of nature, and the number of days are simply those of revelation.. It begins with the affirmation of the invisible Being and, after the successive contributions of science, it ends in that repose of spirit which is faith.” (Pg. 145)
He wrote, “Those whom initiates are entitled to call profane, the vile multitude, that is to say the feeble masses perverse in mind and heart, those who adore a shadowy god or pay lip service to atheism … always listen without understanding, because they are presumptuous and unreliable. If a doctrine is presented to them in an absurd form to please them, they inevitably understand it in an even more absurd sense and often take it completely the wrong way. Thus, when they repeat mechanically that there is one God in three Persons you will find, if you question them, that for them this means one Person in three Gods.” (Pg. 167)
He contends, “The great arcanum, the inexpressible arcanum, the dangerous arcanum, the incomprehensible arcanum may be definitively formulated thus: The divinity of man. It is inexpressible because as soon as one tries to put it into words it becomes a lie and the most monstrous lie of all. In fact, man is not God. And yet the most audacious, the most obscure and at the same time the most splendid of religions asks us to worship the man-God… theology dares to talk in paradoxes. It speaks of worship addressed to the flesh, the eternity of one who dies, of the impassibility of one who suffers, of the immensity of one who transfigures himself, of the finite taking the virtuality of the infinite, in a word of the God-man who offers to make all men God.” (Pg. 175)
He concludes, “God is light. He does not love darkness. Therefore, if we long to feel God within us, we must let the light into our souls. The tree of Knowledge is not a tree of death except for Satan and his apostles… we shall say, ‘Let us do this because we know that it is good and refrain from doing that because we know that is evil.’ And thus will be realized the promise of the symbolic serpent: ‘You will be as gods, knowing good and evil.’” (Pg. 188)
This book may appeal to those interested in metaphysical/occultic topics.
October 12, 2011
I got little from this book when I first read it. Now I admire it for its revealing I knowledge...
"White magnetism is compassion and black magnetism is aversion."
"The great secret of marriage is to postpone the hour of satiety and waking up."
"A refined man with a great soul is the special dream of a woman..."
"Human mediocrity is common because people do not go to extremes."
And much more...
Most of the book is quite dry but the scattered pearls make it a truly precious work.
"White magnetism is compassion and black magnetism is aversion."
"The great secret of marriage is to postpone the hour of satiety and waking up."
"A refined man with a great soul is the special dream of a woman..."
"Human mediocrity is common because people do not go to extremes."
And much more...
Most of the book is quite dry but the scattered pearls make it a truly precious work.
July 10, 2015
one of the most important books I ever read
October 1, 2022
Very interesting philosophy occult book. Some ideas are timeless, but some stuff is just not correct, due to different scientific knowledge and findings back then in 1898.
December 12, 2017
Too many biblical references for my tastes, but that is to be expected from someone who studied to be a Roman Catholic priest.
December 31, 2021
Libro resúmen del pensamiento de E. Levi
June 2, 2023
I am impressed with his work.
Read
December 31, 2024The most dangerous of all follies is perverted wisdom.
September 28, 2021
Holy Smokes! This is an *extremely* good book. I could rip quotes from it all day. Can hardly believe there are only a few reviews of it. It's definitely on par with classics like Blavatsky's Secret Doctrine or Crowley's Magick in Theory and in Practice.
The Great Secret is a more mature work than Transcendental Magic. Whereas Transcendental Magic mixes technical know-how with deeper insight, The Great Secret is made up almost exclusively of philosophical analysis and general mystical principles. People looking for formulae and instructions for specific practices will be disappointed with this book. It is a work of genuine occult philosophy. Any practical import it holds is well-hidden under the guise of metaphor.
Others have voiced concerns about the christian elements of this book. Those same concerns almost kept me from buying it. However, as a very resolute non-christian, I can confidently say that Levi's engagement with christianity is inoffensive. He consistently pokes fun at the fundamentalists as well as the pedants, those variants of christianity most offensive to the mystic. He is more interested in extracting simple moral truths from the gospels, of the type that any person can discover in his or her own conscience.
Is the book perfect? No. There are hints of misogyny, and other problems. But considering the time this book was published, it's not bad in those respects.
The Great Secret is a more mature work than Transcendental Magic. Whereas Transcendental Magic mixes technical know-how with deeper insight, The Great Secret is made up almost exclusively of philosophical analysis and general mystical principles. People looking for formulae and instructions for specific practices will be disappointed with this book. It is a work of genuine occult philosophy. Any practical import it holds is well-hidden under the guise of metaphor.
Others have voiced concerns about the christian elements of this book. Those same concerns almost kept me from buying it. However, as a very resolute non-christian, I can confidently say that Levi's engagement with christianity is inoffensive. He consistently pokes fun at the fundamentalists as well as the pedants, those variants of christianity most offensive to the mystic. He is more interested in extracting simple moral truths from the gospels, of the type that any person can discover in his or her own conscience.
Is the book perfect? No. There are hints of misogyny, and other problems. But considering the time this book was published, it's not bad in those respects.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews