2. Eliphas Levi
If we read about Victorian age magic, Eliphas Levi’s name is bound to come up. He was the man who wrote “Transcendental Magic, its Doctrine and Ritual” which was the biggest influence on many occult societies around the world. The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn was one of the many societies that based its functioning on this very book. He began his magical work in the year 1853 when he met Edward Bulwer-Lytton. Lytton was an author who introduced Levi to Rosicrucianism (a secret magical society based in medieval Germany). He introduced tarot cards and gave them the importance they have today as well as associating the inverted pentacle to evil and the upright one to good. His biggest work was that he introduced the three basic principles of magic around the Victorian age: They were
- That the human willpower could achieve both ordinary and miraculous feats,
- That what we see in the materialistic universe is just one part of reality and
- That a human person is a reflection of the universe on a tiny level and that they are linked and if they act on one, the other could be affected as well.
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