The Devil's Notebook

Foreword

Foreword

It's Amazing how much fear is invoked in others by the presence of a known Satanist. People who never advertise

their religious backgrounds, when confronted by a "Devil worshipper" suddenly become devout. How often I see crosses around the necks of those who've been informed of my arrival -- as if, like Lugosi's Dracula, I will be rendered powerless.

And when I'm not fazed by such precautions, the aroma of nervous sweat really fills the room. It's then that I feel sadistic, if that term ever applied. I love to see those dusty crucifixes salvaged from the bottoms of bureau drawers, unworn since catechism. The evangelical bumper stickers that might just as well say "kick me." The little gold crosses. The pathetic victims of Christian propaganda wearing the symbol of their role model's death around their necks like tiny electric chairs or gas chambers or hangman's nooses, actually believing it will protect them. Protect them from what? My possible cordiality and friendship?

Wearing a display of dormant faith allows them to be safe -- as safe and sure as their advertised deodorant -- to ask me about Satanism. What is it like to be frightened of intangibles? I've never known, because I've always had my share of very real threats to my serenity. I took up Satanism not out of desperation but logical dismay that there were so many short-sighted people around me. I thought, acted, and thereupon found myself removed. An lo and behold, I was a Satanist. A prideful outcast. If the "just," the "good," the "righteous" were exemplified by the cowering ones, I wanted no part of them.

My brand of Satanism is the ultimate conscious alternative to herd mentality and institutionalized thought. It is a studied and contrived set of principles and exercises designed to liberate individuals from a contagion of mindlessness that destroys innovation. I have termed my thought "Satanism" because it is most stimulating under that name. Self-discipline and motivation are effected more easily under stimulating conditions. Satanism means "the opposition" and epitomizes all symbols of nonconformity. Satanism calls forth the strong ability to turn a liability into an advantage, to turn alienation into exclusivity. In other words, the reason it's called Satanism is because it's fun, it's accurate, and it's productive.

The following collection of essays, bits and pieces representing 25 years of diabolical thought, is a Satanic literary exercise in the strictest sense. Each segment is an indulgence of a whim or fancy. Each was written as the mood or idea manifested itself, whether or not what was written would be good, bad, offensive, pleasing, or even whether it would see print. Each was set to paper because to refrain from doing so would have meant self-denial.

Essays that are bitter were composed with a need to ritualized bitterness, the setting, form and style landing as the cards were dealt. Instructional or theoretical essays emerged, first as ideas which had to be recorded, then as written essays. Some have been gathering dust for many years and are included because timing demands that they be released. If they have been updated slightly, it is because popular folly has necessitated that comparisons be drawn. A Devil's Notebook must contain divergent observations and paradoxical theories. Like life itself, it is consistent in its inconsistency.

Anton Szandor LaVey

Durango, Mexico

31 August XXVII Anno Satanas