Romance of the Rose

Yes!

Jon

“The Romance of the Rose
By Anthony Roe
(Originally published at Beltane 1997)
Some years ago at a witchy shop in Glastonbury, I found a little grimoire with a spell to enchant a wayward lover.1 This entails tracing the name of the spirit of Venus in the lover’s footprint which is then to be covered with rose petals. A simple ritual in itself, this operation yet echoes ideas and makes use of symbolism thousands of years old. The great virtue of an occult symbol is that it not only represents something, but also makes manifest the power behind the symbols for those who with faith make use of it. The doctrine of sympathies means that all things in the chain of correspondences may be used in ritual to affect all manner of ministreting (?) forces, and by use of the appropriate symbols even species of the divine power…