referring to its divinatory meaning. The hexagram should be selected by casting the sticks, thereby

ensuring that there is no conscious direction in its selection.

This skrying can be used simply to explore that part of the 'astral' to which each hexagram belongs

(without reference to the text) or can be incorporated in a divination, by skrying the hexagram

produced by the sticks, before consulting the text itself and then combining the results to answer the

question. An example of two such skrying records follows. The first is the I hexagram:

I indicates that with firm correctness there will be good fortune (in what is denoted by it). We must

look at what we are seeking to nourish, and by the exercise of our thoughts seek for the proper ailment

.. His position is perilous, but there will be good fortune. It will be advantageous to cross the great

stream.'

The fifty yarrow sticks were laid out upon the altar, the I Ching unwrapped from its silk cover, the

incense lit, the sticks cast and the hexagram drawn up:

'Upon passing through it the first impression was of crushed honeycomb, a result of the rigid outside

but soft sweet inside of the hexagram.

'A black doorway with the white hexagram engraved on it opened, revealing a softly tumbling

blackness. Passing onwards, a blue bird brushed past. I formulated the hexagram on further veils

ahead but failed to pass through. About to withdraw, but realized that the doors should be Chinese

square double doors not a European arched doorway, and that the hexagram was actually the seal on

the door handles. The door refused to open until I gently pushed forward. On passing through, the skin

on my face seemed to tighten itself round my skull, and intuitively I visualized the hexagram on my

forehead.

'Immediately an image of pine cones appeared which then resolved into a pine tree over a very bright

blue creek with a red lacquer hump-back bridge over it. I crossed the bridge into a clearing paved with

pine-needles. A group of figures wearing light blue appeared. I asked them where I was. As if by

reply, for they hardly stirred, the thought of the blue bird again appeared. I withdrew re-sealing the

doors with the hexagram.'

'The second hexagram skrying is of the Sui hexagram:

techniques of high magick king and skinner