Paul Marteau - the seventh Card "represents setting in motion in seven states, i.e. in all domains" – what we have designated above as "mastership" For Mastership is not the state of being moved, but rather that of being able to set in motion.

The Son of Man resisted being moved by the three temptations in the wilderness; consequently it is he who set in motion the forces which served him. (Matthew iv. 11)

Here, again, is a fundamental law of sacred magic. That which is above being as that which is below, renunciation below sets in motion forces of accomplishment above and the renunciation of that which is above sets in motion forces of accomplishment below. What is the practical meaning of this law?

It is the following.

Desire, and then renounce – here we have the practical magical meaning of the "law" of reward. . . . one has to practice the three sacred vows – obedience, poverty, and chastity.

Let us now consider the text of the Gospel account concerning what happened immediately after the three temptations. "Then the devil left him . . . for a time". Now, these additional words give rise to the supposition that again a trial or temptation – the fourth, which is the most subtle and intimate – is to come. The Card described briefly.

"And behold, Angels came . . . to him" i.e. now they were able to approach him, since a "space" necessary for their descent became free. Why and how?

Angels are entities which move vertically, from above below and from below above. "To move" signifies for them "to change respiration", and "distance" for them amounts to the number – and to the intensity of effort that it comprises – of changes from inhalation to exhalation.

This is why the Angels were unable to approach the Son of Man during the time when the concentrated forces of terrestrial evolution – the forces of the "son of the serpent" – were active.

One can add, by way of a corollary, that the "law of presence" delineated above gives us a strong reason for acknowledging the necessity of churches, temples and consecrated or holy places in general.

". . . and they ministered to him": the plural "they" indicates to us that it is a matter here of three Angels. Each temptation resisted corresponded to an Angel charged with the special mission of reward and who rendered a special service.

What, therefore, were these services?

Just as the three mages offered their presents to the new-born Child – gold, frankincense and myrrh – so did the three angels each offer a present to the Master . . .

This is what happened immediately after the three temptations in the wilderness.

The effect here was Mastership of the world of the elements, and what took place in the course of time was the seven archetypal miracles described in the Gospel according to John.

The seven miracles of the Gospel according to John are, in their totality, the "glory" (doxa) or splendour of the victory of the three sacred vows over the three temptations.

"His disciples believed in him" means to say that they believed in his name, or his mission, which was revealed in its seven aspects by the seven "I AM" sayings quoted above from the Gospel according to John.

Now, the effect of the triumph over the temptation in the wilderness was the manifestation of the seven aspects of Mastership or "glory" (the seven miracles) and the revelation of the mission or "name" of the Master.

What is it a question of in the process of inflation? Let us look first at what Jung himself says about it: (Quotation from Jung and Kerenyi)

Now, this "way of projection" is living symbolism – traditional symbolism as well as symbolism manifesting itself in dreams, "active imagination" and visions. (Quotation from Jung)

The process of individuation is "the spontaneous realisation of the whole man".

Formula

"psyche = ego-consciousness + unconsciousness"

(Quotation from Jung) Now the process of individuation is that of the harmonisation of the conscious self and the unconscious in the psyche. But the "conscious and unconscious do not make a whole when one of them is suppressed and injured by the other." It is a matter of a harmonisation which is only realisable by way of the re-centering of the personality. This is the aim of the process of individuation, which is at the same time a stage of initiation.

The process of individuation operates, as we have said, by establishing a collaboration between the unconscious and the conscious. The domain of symbols affords such a collaboration and it is here, consequently, that it can begin. Quotations from Jung and Kerenyi on the archetype

Now, inflation is the principle risk that attends each person who seeks the experience of depth, the experience of what is occult, which lives and works behind the façade of phenomena of ordinary consciousness. … Thus, if Sabbatai Zevi had been a member of a spiritual order with a discipline similar to that of Christian spiritual orders and monasteries, his illumination would never have led to his revealing himself to a group of disciples as the promised Messiah. Quotation from G. G. Scholem

The history of the illuminated Cabbalist Sabbatai Zevi is only an extreme case of the general dangers and trials which all practicing esotericists have to face. Quotation from Hargrave Jennings The Rosicrucians, Their Rites and Mysteries

Let us say absurd as well as sublime, because inflation is always simultaneously sublime and absurd. Quotation from Eliphas Levi, Dogme et ritual de la haute magie

Is it a matter here of a programme or of actual experience?

Whatever it may be, the experience or programme of this Hebrew manuscript of the sixteenth century quoted by Eliphas Levi shows a remarkable similarity to the experience of John Custance, described by him in his book Wisdom, Madness and Folly: the Philosophy of a Lunatic

The state described by John Custance is characteristic of that of acute mania, and the author himself in no way denies it. But would he still look at it in this way, one can ask, if he knew that his experience is found described exactly in the Brhadaranyaka Upanishad…

Thirty-eight years ago I knew a tranquil man of mature age who taught English at the YMCA in the capital of a Baltic country.

When he spoke to me of these things his beautiful blue eyes rayed out sincerity and certainty. But this radiance gave way to a dark and angry look as soon as I raised the question of the value of the "subjective feeling of eternity" when one is not aware of or one is unable objectively to do something more towards helping humanity, be it in spiritual (or other) progress, or in the alleviation of spiritual, psychic and bodily suffering.

Spiritual megalomania is as old as the world. Quotation from Ezekiel xxviii 12-17

Here is the higher (i.e. celestial) origin of inflation, superiority complex and megalomania. And since "that which is below is as that which is above", it is repeated below in human earthly life from century to century and generation to generation.

One speaks often of the dangers of occultism. Black magic is usually the supreme danger against which the beginner is put on guard by the "masters"; others see it as disorders of the nervous system.

But experience during forty-five years of practical occultism (or esotericism) has taught me that the danger of occultism is neither black magic nor nervous disorder … Indeed, is it difficult to name politicians who have exercised a deadly, suggestive influence on the popular masses blinding them and inciting them to acts of cruelty, injustice and violence, of which each individual, taken separately, would be incapable …? And is not this action to deprive men of their moral freedom and to render them possessed the aim and very essence of black magic?

No, dear Unknown Friend, occultists are neither masters nor disciples of black magic. Truth to tell, they are amongst those who have least of all in common with it. … Besides, where can one find a class of human beings who never make mistakes? The mistake of Doctor Faustus

It is Mephistopheles’ way of giving a lesson to those who want to be "supermen"; he brings to light the puerility of their pretensions . . . show(s) the ridiculousness and absurdity of the aspirations and pretensions of so-called "supermen". Quotation from Goethe’s Faust, lines 97-99

Let us therefore not condemn the rogue of the spiritual world, and above all let us not be afraid of him. Nor let us condemn Doctor Faustus, our brother . . . he was one-hundred times more innocent with respect to mankind than our contemporaries who have invented the nuclear bomb . . . as good citizens and scientists.

No, neither black magic nor nervous disorders constitute the special dangers of occultism. Its principle danger – of which, however, it has no monopoly – is designated by the three terms: superiority complex, inflation, megalomania.

In fact, an occultist (who is not a beginner) who has not attained this moral illness, or who has not at some time in the past undergone it, is rare.

I do not want to cite passages from occult literature, nor to name names, nor to mention biographical facts concerning known occultists, in order to prove or illustrate this diagnosis. But what should one do against this danger, in order to guard one’s moral well-being?

The real triumph achieved by the Self – this means to say the successful outcome of the "process of individuation", according to C.G. Jung, …

The "triumpher" on the Chariot can therefore signify either a sick person suffering from megalomania or a man who has passed through catharsis or purification, the first of the three stages on the way of initiation.

The thesis that I am advancing here is this: that , just as with all the other Cards of the Arcana of the Tarot, the Card of the seventh Arcanum also expresses a double meaning. The personage on the seventh Card signifies at one and the same time the "triumpher" and the "Triumpher" the megalomaniac and the integrated man, master of himself.

The integrated man, master of himself, conqueror in all trials – who is he?

It is he who holds in check the four temptations – i.e. the three temptations in the wilderness described in the Gospels as well as the temptation which synthesizes them: the temptation of pride …

The four columns supporting the canopy on the chariot drawn by two horses, in the Card of the seventh Arcanum, therefore signify the four elements taken in a vertical sense, i.e. in their analogous meaning through the three worlds – the spiritual world, the soul world and the physical world.

And what is signified by the canopy itself that the four columns support?

Tabernacles … are these not tents, baldachins, canopies under which man is united in love with the Divine, without identifying himself with it or being absorbed by it? Mandukya Upanishad, 2 Aitareya Upanishad, 5,3

A philosophy based on the mystical experience of the Self, which represents it in the purest way and is least distorted by the addition of hazardous intellectual speculations, is that of the Indian school of Sankya. … Vedanta philosophy

The third sort of mystical experience is that of the living God, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob… Here it is a matter of union with God in love, which implies a substantial duality being essentially at one.

This experience has as its principle characteristic trait the synthesis of the intoxication of Nature mysticism and the sobriety of mysticism of the higher Self. … And this experience is all the more elevated the more complete the differentiation is, and the more perfect the union is. For this reason the Holy Cabbala puts at the centre of spiritual experience that of the Holy Face (arich anphin) … Quotation Sepher Yetzirah And St. John of the Cross spoke of his experiences of the divine Presence in the tabernacles of love only in the language of love.

The three forms of mystical experience have their "hygienic laws", or their "tabernacles" or "skins". They fall under the law of temperance or measure.

The "triumpher" of the seventh Arcanum is the true adept of Hermeticism, i.e. an adept of mysticism, gnosis and magic – divine, human and natural.

This peace is equilibrium or justice, where each particular force playing its part in the life of the microcosm is assigned its rightful place in the life of the entire psychic and physical organism.

Equilibrium or justice is the subject of the following Arcanum – the eighth Arcanum, Justice – which will be the theme of the next Letter.

Summarising the practical teaching of the seventh Arcanum of the Tarot, one can say that the "triumpher" is a convalescent"; i.e. that the "triumpher" has triumphed over sickness or imbalance . . .

In other words, he holds in check the influences, in so far as they are baleful, of the moon … He is not without the planets, archetypes or achontes … The psychic body is a body in so far as it is composed of unconscious, collective or "planetary" psychic forces.

What is the eighth force which puts the seven forces of the astral body in equilibrium?

It is the eighth Arcanum of the Tarot, Justice, which gives the answer to this question.