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Bide the Hear now the words of the witches,
The secrets
we hid in the night,
When dark was our destiny's pathway,
That now we bring forth into light.
Mysterious water and
fire,
The earth and the wide-ranging air,
By hidden quintessence we know them,
And will keep silent and dare.
The
birth and rebirth of all nature,
The passing of winter and spring,
We share with the life universal
Rejoice in the
magical ring.
Four times in the year the Great Sabbat
Returns, and the witches are seen
At Lammas and Candlemas dancing,
On
May Eve and old Hallowe'en,
When day-time and night-time are equal,
When sun is at greatest and least,
The four Lesser
Sabbats are summoned,
And Witches gather in feast
Thirteen silver moons in a year are,
Thirteen is the coven's array.
Thirteen
times at Esbats make merry,
For each golden year and day.
The power that was passed down the age,
Each time between
woman and man,
Each century unto the other,
Ere time and the ages began.
When drawn is the magical circle,
By
sword or athame of power,
Its compass between two worlds lies,
In land of the shades for the hour.
This world has
no right then to know it,
And world of beyond will tell naught.
The oldest of Gods are invoked there,
The Greatest
of magic is wrought.
For the two are mystical pillars,
that stand at the gates of the shrine,
And two are the powers
of nature,
The forms and the force divine.
The dark and the light in succession,
The opposites each unto each,
Shown
forth as a God and a Goddess:
Of this our ancestors teach.
By night he's the wild wind's rider
The Horn'd One, the
King of the Woodland
The dweller in green forest glades.
She is youthful or old as she pleases,
She sails the torn
clouds in her barque,
The bright silver lady of midnight,
The crone who weaves spells in the dark.
The master and
mistress of magic,
That dwell in the deeps of the mind,
Immortal and ever-renewing,
with power to free or to bind.
And
Do What You Will be the challenge,
So be it love that harms none,
For this is the only commandment
By Magic of old,
be it done
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