PREFACE

The works of Éliphas Lévi on the science of the ancient mages will form a complete course divided into three parts:

The first part contains the Dogma and Ritual of High Magic; the second, the History of Magic; the third, the Key to the Great Mysteries, which will be published later.

Each of these parts, studied separately, provides a complete teaching and seems to contain the entire science. But to have a full and complete understanding of one, it will be indispensable to carefully study the other two.

This ternary division division into three parts of our work was given to us by the science itself; for our discovery of the great mysteries of this science rests entirely on the meaning that the ancient hierophants high priests of the mysteries attached to numbers. Three was for them the generating number, and in the teaching of any doctrine they first considered the theory, then the realization, and then the adaptation to all possible uses. Thus were formed the dogmas, whether philosophical or religious. Thus the dogmatic synthesis of Christianity