Readers, please enjoy this guest blog post by Donald Tyson, author of several books, including The Demonology of King James I, Necronomicon, The Power of the Word, and The Serpent of Wisdom: Essays on Western Occultism. The thing that has always fascinated me about magic is how it actually functions. What lies at the root of magic? Amid all the bewildering diversity of magical practices around the world, and throughout human history, what is the underlying core of magic that never changes? And how can we reconcile this most ancient of all the human arts with the materialistic and scientific viewpoint of modern times? I began my own magical odyssey nearly forty years ago with a study