Hermetic Magick

              The Hermetic tradition has a long and prestigious history, one far too complex and exhaustive to detail in these few pages of a single book. There are quite literally libraries full of texts and manuscripts from the Hermetic tradition.  What will be attempted here is a basic introduction to Hermeticism.  It is important to have a working knowledge of the tradition that is most closely related to post-modern magick, and is in many ways the precursor to the post-modern approach.
              The Hermetic tradition has is roots in the eclectic miasma of mythology, philosophy, theology, folklore, and magic that was synthesized by a great many occult writers and explorers throughout history.  The original idea held by these individuals, at least the idea in a functional form, was that they would combine as many of the above methods as possible into a useable system that breached the cultural boundaries in the search for a universal discipline.
              They postulated that if one could strip away much of the cultural dogma that surrounded the mystical teachings and hearth knowledge of the various traditions, one could successfully combine all of these traditions into a single tradition that was greater than just the sum of its parts. This led to a flourishing exploratory occult community, combining all manner of magical practices in an experimental attempt to distill an essence of magick and the occult.
              The primary concern of the Hermetic tradition is to take from each system the most powerful and useful elements and arrange them cross-culturally in order to find the commonalities and most efficient uses.  Once these fundamentals can be identified, then the Hermetic would be able to control the forces of reality without being bound by one culture, dogma, or system. 
              For the Hermetic, magick can easily be divided into an infinity of forms, and new techniques are developed and implemented often, so listing them would be an unending process.  So for the sake of clarity and pedagogy, the ten basic forms will be listed, as well as five of the most fundamental techniques.
              These forms are very basic, though the details of the form can be made more specific should one choose.
              The forms are Animal (animals), Aquam (water), Auram (air), Corpus (body), Herbam (plants), Ignem (fire), Imaginem (image), Mentam (mind), Terram (earth), and Vim (power).
              The same precautionary statement should be made for the techniques in that these are the fundamentals, are more refined techniques can and have been created and used.
              The techniques are Creo (creation), Intellego (perception), Muto (transformation), Perdo (destruction), and Rego (control).

The Latin names are used both to provide an additional empowering departure from the norm, and to make it easier to form ritually appropriate sentences of form and technique.  All Hermetically oriented spells can be classified within three types of magick.

              Formulaic magick is very structured.  Formulaic spells are intricate combinations of invocations, gestures, and physical foci used to channel, define, and tightly focus the present magical forces.  Though Formulaic spells often take a long time to research, develop, and master, once integrated and committed to memory they enable the magic user to control vast and puissant forces with relative ease.  Most Hermetic study is concerned with Formulaic Magick, and the majority of the available writings pertain to it.
              Spontaneous magick however, sacrifices power a precision for versatility and speed. Instead of using the finely controlled rigors of a formulaic spell, the magic user simply combines a few words or gestures that are appropriately significant with magical energy summoned for the spell, and wills the effect to occur.  Though easier and faster than any other magic, spontaneous magick is resultantly less powerful and its effects temporary.
              Ritual magick, on the opposite end of the magical spectrum from spontaneous, is the most powerful and most time consuming of the three types of magick.  Rituals, in general, take a long time to perform, and as a source of potency usually require the caster to incorporate rare or difficult elements into the ritual.  Exotic or expensive plant and animal material, archaic languages, forgotten symbols or names, and all manner of challenging ceremonial verses and sympathetic foci are all part of ritual magick. Because of the preparation, performance challenges, and inherent specificity of rituals, they become the most precise and puissant of spells available to a magus of any knowledge or ability.
              There are other, less fundamental types of magick.  While they are not discussed at length here, they are chiefly concerned with the summoning, channeling, benevolence, or evocation of external spiritual beings.