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French literary figure Charles Baudelaire was a member of the infamous Club of the Hashish-Eaters, a Parisian literary group dedicated to the exploration of altered states of consciousness, principally through the use of hashish. The Poem of Hashish was first published in 1850. This is Aleister Crowley’s translation of it, from 1895. Baudelaire was part of the French art movement known as saymbolism, which acted as a reaction to realism and placed a lot of emphasis on the power of dreams and the imagination as tools for communicating ideals through symbols.

Anthony Trollope’s The Small House at Allington is the fifth book in a series called The Chronicles of Barsetshire but is the most well-known of the series due to its writing quality and timeline placement within the series. The novel follows the Dales, a family who occupies a large estate. Christopher is the owner of the estate, and allows his widowed sister and her children to live on a small house on the property. The novel largely follows the children, Lilian and Isabella, as they are courted and try to find their place among society.

These are the remaining fragments from the otherwise lost hymns of Hermes Trismegistus. Included are the gnostic hymns: "A Triple Trisagion", "A Hymn to All-Father God", "The Secret Hymnody", "A Hymn of Grace for Gnosis", and "A Song of Praise to the Aeon". Translated with additional commentary by esoteric scholar, G. R. S. Mead.

Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109) was the outstanding philosopher-theologian of the Latin West between Augustine and the thirteenth century. As a public figure, especially as Archbishop of Canterbury, he corresponded with kings and nobles, popes and bishops, in letters that reveal a fascinating personality and flesh out the practical dimensions of his theoretical philosophy. He wrote at a time when a renewed interest in logic encouraged careful and rigorous argumentation, but before the recovery of Aristotle filled the philosophical discourse.

The unifying factor of this collection is that, without exception, every author included here was in some way or another involved with or interested in the occult. In some cases, they were members of an occult organization, such as the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, the Theosophical Society, or similar such groups. Others simply had a strong personal interest in the subject matter or practiced some form of the esoteric sciences in private.

Don Alvaro, a young but wise man, invokes Satan in a goetic-style magical ritual. Upon seeing the young Alvaro, Beelzebub falls in love with him and assumes the appearance of a beautiful young woman. In the journey that unfolds, Satan, disguised as a woman, tries to seduce Alvaro who rejects his advances lest he lose his precious virginity.

In 1665, London was struck by the bubonic plague, an epidemic that was the last major instance of the bubonic plague in England. This instance of the plague killed 100,000 people over a year and a half, and was transmitted through rats that ran through the city. A Journal of the Plague Year was presented as an eyewitness account of the epidemic through the eyes of Londoners.

All that we achieve and all that we fail to achieve is the direct result of our own thoughts. “Self-control is strength. Right thought is mastery. Calmness is power.” (James Allen, As a Man Thinketh) As Allen himself describes, “It shows how, in his own thought-world, each man holds the key to every condition, good or bad, that enters into his life, and that, by working patiently and intelligently upon his thoughts, he may remake his life, and transform his circumstances…and it can be carried in the pocket.”

In 1967, Fay Stonewell, a water tank escape artist in Florida, leaves for Vietnam to join the Amazing Humans—a jerry-rigged carnival there to entertain the troops—abandoning her disabled teenage son, Dickie, to the care of an abusive boyfriend. Months after Fay’s departure, Dickie’s troubled home life ends in a surprising act of violence that forces him to run away. He soon lands in Manhattan, where he’s taken in by eccentric artist Laurence Jones. Fay, meanwhile, is also facing dangerous threats.

Aleister Crowley left behind a literary legacy of hundreds of examples of his authorship, in diverse categories of writing. Collected here is a sampling of those writings.

Mr. Barnstaple is an average man living in English in the early 1900s. He is a journalist and after facing a stressful time at his newspaper decides to take a vacation. But his vacation goes from ordinary to extraordinary in an instant when his vehicle is transported to an alternate world, one called Utopia.

When Taj sets a trap to catch his parents pretending to be the Tooth Fairy, he finds the real Tooth Fairy fried by the wire he’d connected to a couple nine-volt batteries. Instead of spending his summer vacation building robots and taking it easy, he’s pretending to fit in with kids who practically worship the holiday seasons. His only hope to return to normal life is to find a way to fit in, or discover who kidnapped the Tooth Fairy and bring them to justice....

Orphaned at a young age, Song has grown up listening to his grandfather recite legends of the distant past. But it is his own history he seeks to uncover, particularly the events surrounding his parents' deaths. That is a secret closely guarded by his grandfather. Then Song discovers an heirloom that links him to an ancient prophecy. His destiny lies within the old tales he has scorned. Song must follow the path that killed his father.

Always a lover of fairy stories yet unable to believe in their truth, young Davy finds himself whisked away on a "Believing Voyage" one magical Christmas Eve by a little red goblin. In a strange country full of wonders, Davy finds himself coming face to face with a whale in a waistcoat; Robin Hood; the last member of the band of Forty Thieves; Robinson Crusoe; talking dogs, horses, and cows; and Mother Hubbard herself, living side by side with Jack's beanstalk!

Frank L. Baum is the famed author of the Wizard of Oz stories. Here he tells the tale of a mischief Jack Frost who learns that he is able to freeze the shadows of humans and in doing so he wreaks havoc throughout a kingdom!

Visited by an angel Theodoros is instructed to make the Gears of Uriel, which is passed from one generation to the next for more than five hundred years. This family are the guardians who protect it from the evil enveloping our world, casting Theodoros' life into mayhem. Following each of his descendants and the danger often accompanying the device, this is a spiritual quest, exposing how religion has often cloaked the truth from mankind, with risk of death to the keepers of truth...

Little did Evan know his suicide attempt would not be a disappearing into a void but the beginning of a journey to repentance and faith. Long suffering from alcoholism and depression, college sophomore Evan Esco hoped to escape his pain by committing suicide. Evan hoped he would simply cease to be, but he did not count on the existence of God to foil his plans. Instead of wrath, God is now giving Evan the chance to repent—that is, the chance to return to the world above, turn from his sins, and place his faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

L. Frank Baum is the famed author of the Wizard of Oz series. In this tale, we meet a fairy named Popopo who is the guardian of all the birds. When he learns that stuffed birds are being used as fashion accessories on the hats of ladies, he decides to put a stop to it.

Thirteen-year-old Aaron was chosen to save their world, but it might come at the cost of losing his own... Breaking into an old lady's basement was supposed to reward Aaron with new friends. Instead he finds an enchanted amulet that transports him to another world - one at war with magic. Before he knows it, he is accused of witchcraft and invited to a bonfire - where he's the main attraction. If that's not bad enough, a goblin army shows up and toasts the town... literally.

Since the loss of his lively, charming wife to cancer six years ago, minister Paul Tobit has been operating on autopilot, performing his religious duties by rote. Everything changes the day he enters the church lobby and encounters a radiant, luminous being lit from behind, breathtakingly beautiful and glowing with life. An angel. For a moment Paul is so moved by his vision that he is tempted to fall on his knees and pray.