Talismans and Sigils

A talisman is an intention given a body. It is an object made at a chosen time, marked with chosen signs, and consecrated to one stated purpose, which then goes on working after the rite is over.

Three words

A talisman is made to bring something about. An amulet is made, or simply worn, to keep something away. A sigil is a drawn figure that stands for a name, a power or an intention. Talismans usually bear sigils, and a sigil may also be used alone.

Making a talisman

1. The purpose

   Write the purpose in one sentence. It should be stated positively, be capable of being checked, and have a term: "That I complete and submit my thesis by midsummer."

2. The planet

   Find the planet that governs the matter in the tables of correspondence. A thesis is a work of Mercury. Its completion against resistance might call for Saturn.

3. The time

   Choose the day and an hour of the planet, with the Moon waxing if something is to increase. Set the date at least a week ahead. The waiting is part of the work.

4. The making

   Cut a disk of card, wood or metal and color it for the planet. On one face draw the sign of the planet and its number square. On the other draw the purpose, reduced to a sigil. Make it with your own hands. A talisman that has been bought is an ornament.

5. The consecration

   In a full rite, with the Hall opened and the planet invoked, pass the talisman through the four elements: the smoke of incense for Air, the heat of the flame for Fire, a touch of water, and a grain of salt for Earth. Speak the purpose over it once. Wrap it in cloth of the planet's color.

6. The keeping and the release

   Carry the talisman or keep it on the bench. Review it on a date fixed in advance. When its purpose is accomplished or its term has run out, thank it and unmake it by water, fire or burial. Nothing consecrated is thrown out with the trash, and nothing is kept forever.

The planetary squares

Each planet has a square of numbers whose order is the number of the planet: three cells a side for Saturn, four for Jupiter, and so on to nine for the Moon. In each, every row, every column and both long diagonals add to the same total. This is the square of Saturn, in which every line makes fifteen:

4	9	2
3	5	7
8	1	6

The traditional way to draw a sigil from a square is to turn the letters of a name or word into numbers and to trace a line from cell to cell in their order. The figure that results is peculiar to that word and that planet.

Sigils in the modern manner

The twentieth century added a method that needs no tables at all. It is taught in the Guild at the grade of Scribe.

1. Write the intention as one short sentence.
2. Strike out every letter that is repeated, so that each letter stands once.
3. Combine the letters that remain into a single figure, and simplify it until the letters can no longer be read.
4. Charge the figure by holding it in undivided attention at a moment when the ordinary chatter of the mind has stopped: at the height of the Lamp, at the end of long exertion, or on the edge of sleep.
5. Put the figure away and turn the mind deliberately to other things.

The reasoning offered is that an intention which the everyday mind keeps handling, by hoping and doubting and checking, is thereby prevented from doing its work, and that the sigil carries it past the door unobserved. The Records of the Guild add two findings. Sigils serve best for modest, specific ends that can be checked. And practitioners are very bad at forgetting.

Testing

Every talisman and sigil made in the Guild is entered in the Record with its purpose, its date and a date of review. At the review the member writes one of three things: accomplished, not accomplished, or cannot tell. The third is the commonest honest answer. After fifty such entries a practitioner knows something about his or her own work that no book could have supplied.