sympathetic magic, n.All

Sympathetic magic is not possible unless both magician and victim are at the mercy of the powerful forces binding them together, the latter unaware of the profound effects transforming him, the former equally unaware of what precisely he has conjured up from Heaven or Hell. If it were otherwise, the spell would shatter, the invisible bonds slacken. Sorcery is a current leaping from one pole to another in an energy transmission whose primary source is no less obscure to the witch than the bewitched. They are communicating vessels both, the witch receiving spiritual messages and then transmitting them to the bewitched, who discharges them in turn—but neither ever knows when the message is complete or when he has finished conveying it. The flow goes on independent of the agent’s control, nor has the witch any way of telling when the victim’s vessel is full. Only when the latter suddenly cracks or breaks from the unchecked volume of the psychic flow, only then when it is too late to shut the valve, does the magician wake up to realize what 8 has passed through them both.

Sympathetic magic is not possible unless both magician and victim are at the mercy of the powerful forces binding them together, the latter unaware of the profound effects transforming him, the former equally unaware of what precisely he has conjured up from Heaven or Hell.