MSTed: Aleister Crowley on Atlantis-5
M Sampo
>progress; the labour-mills were run without a hitch, and the
>next event was the discovery of black phophorus. It had been
>the custom to worship the Atla with lights, and these lights had
>been candles of yellow phosphorus in golden sheathes. At that
>time the Atla was veiled. At one festival of Spring the veils
>were burnt up, the lights extinguished, and the yellow
>phosphorus was found to have been turned into the black powder.
TOM: This was no boating accident!
>The magicians examined this, and brought Zro to its ninth stage.
>This revolutionized the condition of things: old age and
>disease were no more, and death voluntary. Strangely enough
>this led directly to the Great Conspiracy.
CROW (Nixon): Liddy and the Plumbers will break into the Watergate...
>At the end of this period of 2500 years the system of 'houses'
>was well established. There were over 400 such 'houses', each
>of perhaps 1000 souls on an average. These were governed by 4
>'houses of houses' whose rulers took orders from the High House,
>at the head of which was the living Atla. The plain principle
>of Atlas was revolution; and like all revolutionary bodies, was
>obliged to adopt the strictest form of autocracy. A democracy
>is always soddenly conservative. The only hope is to catch it
>in one of its moments of crazy enthusiasm, and crush it before
>it has time to recover.
MIKE: Thomas Paine couldn't have said it better himself.
> Caesar and Napoleon both did this as
>far as they could; Cromwell and Porfirio Diaz did the same
>within narrower limits.
TOM: And *I* did it with the local PTA.
>Now a certain sophist--for philosopher one cannot call him--
>tried to enunciate a magical law to the effect that the present
>standard of life was all that could be desired; that further
>progress would be harmful, that Venus was not worth attaining,
>and that the sole endeavour of the magicians should be to
>preserve things as they were.
CROW: Wow! Jesse Helms really IS old!
> That such a proposition could be
>supposed a 'law' reflects no credit on its author or its
>supporters. Yet of these it found many. The ninth stage of Zro
>was a leap calculated to unsettle the calmest mind. Its reality
>had beggared the optimist's daydream. Poets had thrown down
>their stilettos.
MIKE: Ah, the legendary stiletto-weilding poets of Atlantis...
> High Priests who had spent decades in hopeful
>experiment saw their results attained by an entirely different
>method. In short, two thirds of the people were infected with
>the heresy, and hoped to hear it promulgated as a Law of Magic.
>It should here be explained that every Law of Magic had its turn
>as the principal law of practical working, and the school
>supporting any law, or insisting on it, became prominent with it.
TOM: For a complete list email Zan...@UAtlantis.edu
>Every dominant law in all history had always been made
>insignificant by a new discovery about Zro, or other matter of
>practical importance, just as the "Peace with Honour" battle-cry
>of Disraeli was drowned by the calculation of the cost of
>warships, soldiers and patriotism.
CROW: He keeps sneaking that political commentary in there!
> Each step in Zro had
>consequently implied the rise to power of a new school; and the
>sophist was ambitious, and yet the law he wished to establish
>was the ruling law of the servile races.
>The 'law' was accordingly sent to the High House for approval.
>Some opposition may have been forseen, but no one was prepared
>for the blackness of disapproval which actually radiated,
>striking hearts cold. A course without precedent, no answer was
>vouchsafed. On the contrary, even normal communication was
>suspended.
TOM: I think Aleister vaporlocked again...
> The houses which favoured the innovation--333 in
>numbers--took counsel, came to the decision that it was useless
>to oppose the High House, and were about to acquiesce, when a
>woman who had once been in the presence of 'To Her' rose and
>thought vehemently 'The Living Atla is the head of our
>conspiracy'.
MIKE: You know, in Atlantis, it must have been a crime to think "fire" in
a crowded theater.
> In other words, they were the loyalists, the
>Magicians of the High House the rebels. This was why they had
>cut themselves off, because their own head was against them. It
>was instantly resolved to go to the High House, and demand the
>custody of 'To Her'. Nearing the goal, however, a remnant of
>the ancient reverence half cowed even the ringleaders--I may
>mention that five of every six of the heretics were women
CROW: And we KNOW what THAT means!
> --when
>they saw a stern phalanx of magicians, its point threatening
>their centre. As they wavered, a woman cried "They are only men
>such as we are." The ranks stiffened;
(CROW takes a breath to say something)
MIKE: Crow, don't even start...
> on all sides the army
>closed upon the tiny phalanx, which only numbered 66 all told.
>It was then that the truth was known. Ere a blow could be
>struck, the attacking party vanished;
TOM: Now, which was the attacking party?
CROW: Not a clue, Tom, I got lost back around the seventh form of Zro.
> it was instantaneous and
>complete annihilation. From that moment it was certain that the
>ruling power in Atlas was Something infinitely more awful than
>the Living Atla.
MIKE: Barry Diller!!
> In order to avoid any possible repetition of
>such a disaster--for the Magicians of the High House knew that
>any manifestation of the Supreme must undo the work of centuries--
>they gave out that they had become too terrible to look upon,
>and for the future they always appeared with heavy veils, or
>rather masks, since for the most part they were carven
>fantastically by the wearers in their leisure hours.
TOM: I thought leisure was forbidden?
CROW: Tom, sometimes you just have to let crap FLOW over you
> A further
>alteration was made in the system of government. The head of
>one of the 'houses of houses' was made supreme:
MIKE: And the Contract With Atlanis was approved.
> the High House
>took no part in affairs of state. Thus the Atla was to all
>intents and purposes deposed, although the same reverence and
>sacrifice were paid to it as formerly. It became a
>'constitutional monarch', in our modern jargon.
TOM: And the tabloids printed all sorts of rumors about who the Atla was
sleeping with.
>The next thousand years were years of serious trial in other
>ways. The toil of repopulation was excessive,
CROW: Oh, honey, not again!
> and there was a
>revolt or rather strike of the servile races, which was ended by
>the substitution of 'bread from heaven' for those products of
>the earth on which they had formerly been fed, a diet which
>proved so adapted to their natures that no labour troubles ever
>recurred.
MIKE: Oh, so somebody DID form the Atlantean Socialist Workers Party!
TOM: I have to say, I don't see "No more feeding us dead bodies" as an
unreasonable demand...
>The Greek legends of the wars between Gods, giants, Titans are
>traditional of a real war or series of wars which continued with
>intervals over 200 years. The enemy had developed naval
>armament to an extreme. Their tactics were these:
>
>1. To wipe out the servile races and so to interfere with the
> production of Zro.
>2. To rush and destroy the High House.
CROW: Call in the ATF!
MIKE: Ouch! Kinda harsh, Crow!
>The first of these met with a great deal of success, the
>floating rock being struck with projectiles and sunk.
TOM: And the rubber ducky was damaged as well.
> This
>occurred chiefly on the outlaying islands, where they were not
>too much afraid to make raids in force. They also sent epidemic
>disease of many kinds. Atlas was reduced to such extremity in
>these ways that at one time the waterways were forced and the
>assault on the High House was actually carried out, bombardment
>continuing day and night for months together.
(Tom and Mike make bomardment noises)
CROW: MARINES! WE ARE LEAVING!
> Through a
>misunderstanding of a well known magical law, Atlanteans at that
>time considered themselves prohibited from employing any other
>defence than the rods and the cones of their forefathers; and
>these, it appears, were useless against machinery,
MIKE: But delicious on a hot summer day!
> or against
>men protected by fortification in such a way that they could not
>be got at from any quarter. Thus the sharklike submarines of
>the enemy were unassailable. The war was therefore at first
>entirely one-sided. A certain youthful magician, however,
>resolving to die for his country if need were, decided to
>retaliate. He had found that Zro in its nascent state (i.e.
>between the globes)
TOM: And I think we've all been between the globes at one time or
another...
> had the power of bringing about endothermic
>reaction, seawater for example, becoming caustic soda and
>hydrochloric acid; and further that this acid thus produced was
>many thousand times more active than in its normal state.
CROW (Beakman): Ba-da-bing! Ba-da-boom! Hydrochloric acid!
> For
>example, the rock basins in which he conducted his first
>experiment dissolved as rapidly as butter under boiling oil. He
>then prepared a number of pairs of receiver-globes, and dropped
>them in the vicinity of the enemy's submarines by night. In
>this manner he destroyed the hulls of almost the whole fleet in
>a single night; and the remainder fled in panic at dawn.
MIKE: Run away!! Run away!!
> They
>returned the following year, carrying out daylight raids only
>and devoting themselves chiefly to destroying the labour-mills.
>The young magician had been rewarded for his services by being
>presented to the Atla,
TOM: Congratulations! For saving our nation, you get to be ingested by a
hideous supernatural beast.
> and this example encouraged others to
>find means of attacking the invaders. Artificial darkness was
>therefore invented, and combined with the former method; but
>this was only partially successful, the tremendous pace of the
>'sharks' enabling them to evade any threatening clouds. They
>did enormous damage, and the supplies of Zro were seriously
>curtailed.
MIKE (doper): Supplies are low, man. This town is dry!
> Things now went from bad to worse, and culminated in
>the attack on the High House, the besiegers keeping their
>battleships surrounded by rafts of fire, so that attack was
>impossible even by night.
TOM (singing): Rafts on fire, rolling down the rooooaaad!
> It was then that the High House
>called on the heorism of its sons. Armed with long swords of
>Zro, they plunged into the sea, to perish under the tooth of the
>Zhee-Zhou,
CROW: Who was busy slapping a traffic cop.
TOM: That was a reach, Crow.
CROW: Not for her!
TOM: D'oh!
> but not before they had time to hack the invading
>battleships to shreds. Their floating torch-rafts only assisted
>the attack by directing the swimmers to their quarry.
MIKE (Desi): Lucy! I tol' you not to set da rafts on fire...
CROW (Lucy): Waaaahhhhhh....Ricky!!!
> The
>attack on the High House had aroused Atlas at last. A counter
>invasion was plotted and carried out with immediate and complete
>success, the enemy being exterminated, and their country not
>merely ravaged but destroyed by arousing the forces of
>earthquake. All activity of this kind however was deprecable,
TOM: Under form 1218c...and you can also deduct all the invasion expenses.
> a
>recurrence was guarded against by removing the High House to the
>lofty mountain previously described, and a 'house' was chosen to
>cultivate the art of war, and entrusted with the duty of
>destroying any living thing that might approach within a hundred
>miles of Atlas.
CROW: Thus putting a serious dent in the tourism industry...
>Only one other adventure of historical importance remains to be
>recorded. It is the attempt of some foolish Atlanteans to found
>an 'Empire', and so to be entirely distinguished from the
>missionary effort referred to previously. The original
>settlement of Atlas, as has been the case with all flourishing
>colonies, was made by a few hardy pioneers, who strengthened
>themselves gradually by growth.
TOM: And by executing the natives for fun.
> But Atlas in her momentary
>madness poured out blood and treasure in the fatuous attempt to
>impose alien domination on lands utterly unsuited to the genius
>of the people. The idea, of course, was to increase the supply
>of labour and consequently of crude Zro. In the first place the
>adventure was expensive. It was uneconomical (in the scientific
>sense) to send ships with less than 1000 fighting men. The Zro
>required for these meant the employment of at least 7000
>serviles, and the naval construction was therefore of a colossal
>order.
CROW: It was FAABULOUS!!!
> But although little difficulty was found in conquering
>the country in the military sense, the natives had to be almost
>exterminated, and the labour of the survivors proved difficult
>to enforce. It was even then not a tenth as efficient as that
>of the serviles at home. The imported serviles moreover caught
>native diseases, and died in hundreds; and though by prodigious
>sacrifices the West African Empire was kept going for nearly 200
>years, it had to end at last no less ingloriously than the
>French adventure in Mexico, or the English in India, and South
>Africa.
MIKE: Or Heaven's Gate.
>The main causes were the impossibility of breeding children in a
>climate so unsuitable, even of maintaining their own women, and
>above all the fact that the crude Zro was not of a quality equal
>to that obtained in Atlas, and that the Zro generated by the
>Atlanteans themselves was not to be made at all outside their
>own country. The lesson was learnt.
TOM: And learnt well...
> Until the end no further
>attempt was made to advance in any but the true direction. The
>great majority of the colonists returned to Atlas; but many,
>degenerating as is the fashion with colonists of this conquering
>kind, abandoned Zro for gross food, intermarried with the
>natives, and have generally degenerated yet further to races
>inferior even to the present descendants of those who were in
>those days the equivalents of the serviles of Atlas.
CROW: Which explains Tor Johnson, I think...
>IX. OF THE CATASTROPHE, ITS ANTECEDENTS AND PRESUMED CAUSES.
>In my remarks on Zro I have a necessarily somewhat diffuse
>account of the properties of this remarkable substance. It must
>now be made clearer that the crude Zro in its nine stages
>produced by the serviles, and consumed in the 'houses' was in
>each stage of inferior quality to that of the same degree
>produced by the Atlanteans, and consumed by the High House.
MIKE: I always get the high-octane zro...
> For
>example, the crude Zro was made in a labour-mill with all sorts
>of insulations. The first stage of the priest's Zro could be
>made anywhere and at any time, and naturally directed itself to
>the receptable for it without any precautions.
TOM: Don't you think that's pretty irresponsible?
MIKE (Sheik guy): It's repression, man!!!
> It must, I
>think, be presumed that the Zro generated in the High House was
>again of far greater purity and potency. Very little of it can
>have been used in the experiments of the magicians, and it is
>therefore necessary to account for enormous quantities, produced
>during many centuries of uninterrupted labour.
CROW: I admit it!! I've been embezzling it!!
> I have, however,
>no data of any kind for this investigation; the mysteries of the
>High House have ever been inscrutable, and were not wholly
>delivered to the Heirs of Atlas. They must be rediscovered by
>the magicians of the new race.
MIKE: The Daytona 500, for example...
> It may be that in some form or
>other the Zro had been made stable, and used to impregnate the
>column which is alleged to have been driven 'through the Earth';
>perhaps, and less improbably, only to the depth of a few hundred
>miles. This column, however long it may have been, had
>certainly its top immediately beneath the reservoir of the High
>House.
(Mike and the Bots begin humming the Hogan's Heroes theme)
TOM (Schultz): I know nothing!! NOTHING!!
> It had been completed about 70 years before the
>'catastrophe' but apparently no effort was made to utilize it in
>any way. To me it appears probable that in some one mind the
>whole 'catastrophe' was brooding, that the column was part of
>the device, and that the event which I shall now describe was
>the other part.
>This event was the birth of a child in the High House, a child
>without the distinguishing mark of the daughters of Atlas. That
>any child at all should have been born there is so incredible
>that I am inclined to suspect an improper use of the word 'born'.
CROW: Cloned, perhaps.
>I think rather that a magician brought Zro to its eleventh
>stage, when it takes human form, and lives!
MIKE: Exclamation point!
> The alternative
>theory is that of the 'Angel of Venus' described in the chapter
>on the Underground Gardens of Atlas. The supporters of this
>theory hold that the child was not born of a priestess, but of
>the Living Atla.
TOM: But those people are insane.
>In any case, the whole country gave itself up to unbridled
>rejoicing. Work was carried on at a greater speed than ever
>before: one might say a delirium of labour. For eleven years
>this continued without cessation, and then without warning came
>the order to repair to the High House--every man, woman and
>child of Atlas.
CROW: And wash my car, too!
> What was then done, I know not, and dare not
>guess; that same day seven volunteers, heroic exiles from the
>reward of so many centuries of toil, voluntary maroons on the
>discarded planet,
MIKE (Bugs Bunny): What a maroon!
> the Heirs of Atlas, turned their faces from
>the High House, and severally sought distant mountains, there
>each to guard his share of the Secrets of the Holy Race,
CROW: The Indianapolis Fi--
MIKE: I DID that joke already.
CROW: Oh, sorry.
> and in
>due time to discover and train up fit children of other races of
>the earth so that one day another people might be founded to
>undertake another such task as that now ended.
>Hardly had the pinnacle of Atlas melted into the sea behind
>them, than the 'catastrophe' occurred.
TOM (Durante): What a catastrophy!
> The High House and the
>column beneath it, with all the inhabitants of Atlas, shot from
>the earth with the vehemence of a million lightnings, bound for
>that green blaze of glory that scintillated in the West above
>the sunset.
CROW: Lompoc.
TOM (Rocketship XM guy): We're on our way!!
>Instantly the Earth, its god departed, gave itself up to anguish.
MIKE: Ya gonna cry now, baby? 1, 2, 3--CRY!
>The sea rushed unto the void of the column and in a thousand
>earthquakes Atlas, 'houses' and plains together were overwhelmed
>forever in the ocean. Tidal waves rolled round the world;
TOM: But my basement remained dry as a bone!
>everywhere great floods carried away villages and towns;
>earthquakes rocked and tempests roared; tumult was triumphant.
>For years after the catastrophe the dying tremors of the Event
>still shook mankind with fear. And the eternal waves of the
>great mother rolled over Atlas, save where Earth in her agony
>thrust up gaunt pinnacles, bare masts of wreckage to mark the
>vanished continent.
CROW: And souvenir stands just down the road from the main hotel.
> Save for its heirs, of whose successors it
>is my highest honour to be the youngest and the least worthy,
MIKE: That goes without saying...
>oblivion fell, like one last night in which the sun should be
>forever extinct, upon the land of Atlas and its people.
TOM: Bummer, man.
>Shall such high purpose fail of emulation, such achievement and
>example not excite us to like striving?
ALL: No.
> Then let earth fall
>indeed from her high place in heaven, and mankind be outcast
>forever from the sun!
MIKE: And now, a paid political message:
> Men of Earth! Seek out the heirs of Atlas;
>let them order you into a phalanx, let them build you into a
>pyramid, that may pierce that appointed which awaits you,
TOM: Let them have your credit card numbers!
> to
>establish a new dynasty of Atlanteans to be the mainstay and
>mainspring of the Earth,
CROW: SOMEbody's mainspring is would a LITTLE too tightly...
> the pioneers of their own path to
>heaven, and to our lord and Father, the Sun! And he put his
>hand upon his thigh,
ALL: Sayyyyyyyy!
> and swore it.
>By the ineffable, Tla, and by the holy Zro, did he swear it,
>and entered into the body of the new Atla that is alive upon the
>earth.
TOM: Yeah, whatever you say, Gramps. Let's get outta here, guys...
(They rise and leave)
1.....2.....3.....4.....5.....6.....{CLUNK}
[SOL]
(Mike, Tom, Crow and Gypsy are at the desk. Mike is back to normal.)
MIKE: Well! That was a rough one! But at least I'm back to normal!
GYPSY: Yeah!
CROW: I STILL kinda thought--
TOM: Shut up, Crow. Mike, aren't you the least bit ANGRY about what Dr.
Forrester did to you?
MIKE: Well...no...not really...
GYPSY: Wow!
TOM: You mean you resolved to rise above his evil nature and be a better
person?
MIKE (chuckles): Hah! No way! I just mean that I already got even! For the
last half hour, I've been flooding Deep 13 with my OWN odorless, colorless
transformation gas...one that will turn Dr. Forrester into--
(Deep 13 light flashes)
--well (chuckles) I'll let you see for yourself! (taps button)
[DEEP 13]
(Dr. F has been transformed into Crow [costume similar to the one used in
episode 518--beak over mouth and ping pong balls in eyes].)
DR. F (Crow's voice): I wanna decide who lives and who dies!
[SOL]
(All are horrified, except Crow)
GYPSY: Oh, my lord!
TOM: Mike, what have you done?!
MIKE: I think you're right! I had no idea how terrifying the result would
be!
CROW: Actually, I--
MIKE, TOM & GYPSY: SHUT UP, CROW!
[DEEP 13]
(Dr. F. is closing a valve. He finishes, then tears the ping pong balls
out of his eyes. Storms over to the camera and looks into it.)
DR. F (through Crow beak, but normal voice, seething with anger): I'll get
you for this, Nelson! Somehow....some way....(suddenly Crow's voice
returns, singing) Soooome day my prince will coooome!!! (Dr. F. looks
horrified and clutches his throat. Then he looks at the camera.) D'oh!!
(He lunges for the button.)
WOOSH!
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Mystery Science Theater 3000, its characters, trademarks and situations,
are (C) Copyright 1995 Best Brains, Inc. This document is intended for
amusement and entertainment purposes only and no infringement of any
copyright held by Best Brains Inc. or any of its employees past or
present, Comedy Central or any of its employees past or present and/or the
artist formerly known as Joel Hodgson is intended or should be in any way
inferred. This document may not be sold but it is free to be distributed
provided this disclaimer remains in tact in its entirety.
No offense was meant if any loony toon Atlantis nutball reads this and
gets pissed.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
>The best results of this work was a race of translucent jelly-folk of
great >intellectual development
Sampo
=======================================================
I've undergone a complex personal evolution wherein painful confusion has
given way to what I like to think of as some degree of wisdom, culminating
in my current Zarathustrian sense of self. Is that it?
=======================================================