Anton Szandor LaVey

To sum up our political doctrine: Satanism IS Americanism in its purest form, with only the outdated moral codes altered to fit the times, and with recognition of the fact that only if man’s most basic instincts are satisfied can a nation receive his best.

If I were to build a roller coaster, it would be shot through with visual and audible warnings to hang on and not stand up while the car is in motion. Anyone failing to comply with the very real warnings would hurl to the ground.

One cannot have a true sense of humor without an equal sense of the profound. The familiar cliché of the clown whose heart is breaking holds great validity.

Always move on. Never dwell on your desire in dragged-out bits and pieces. Ritualize it out of your system, even if it means isolating yourself in obsessive and painful seclusion. Burn every bit of desire out of your system, and then, when you no longer care, it will come to you.

The highest of all holidays in the Satanic religion is the date of one’s own birth.

We must all respond to imminent situations. We either benefit from, cope with, or succumb to them. But don't go out of your way to encounter any potential problem or worry if you need not. Don't socialize with those who do, either. They'll bring you down.

The less one is aware of the invisible war, the more receptive one is to its ongoing process of demoralization, for the insensate human is vulnerable, malleable, weak, and ripe for control.

Patronize that which is out of vogue or not yet in vogue. Seek out persons who are not harbingers of present mores. Discover and share pastimes unrelated to current phobias.

The art student who has graduated from college with honors can usually land a good commercial or teaching position upon leaving school but not necessarily paint any better than an artist who has never come near an art class but still possesses the highest artistic ability.

Take a lesson from the ostrich, whose head-in-the-sand attitude has been universally ridiculed. If timeliness is an essential ingredient of demoralization, existentialism is a perfect vehicle.

How ironic, that occultists lead the pack of humorless persuasions. In their attempts to discover and utilize the arcane secrets of life and death, they fall short in the most important department.

Fantasy plays an important part in any religious curriculum, for the subjective mind is less discriminating about the quality of its food than it is about the taste.

The psychic vampire is allowed to exist because he cleverly chooses conscientious, responsible people for his victims—people with great dedication to their “moral obligations.”

Recognize it for what it is: a collective phenomenon, self-perpetrating according to Malthusian law. The separation of the strong from the weak, the reactors from the perceivers.

Sociologists are people who get paid for looking at prostitutes and collecting dirty jokes.

I can assure you that people making requires a lot more imagination, skill, patience and resourcefulness than rewriting the Enochian Keys or preparing for an authentic Babylonian lust ritual.

Without an electronic device chattering away, things seem unnaturally quiet, so, under the guise of seeking information and being entertained, we become addicted to the “presence” of tv, radio, or stereo as guiding and stabilizing influences.

In magic, it is imperative that one be able to narrow down his various awarenesses to 𝘰𝘯𝘦 compelling desire towards which a ritual is performed.

Morality is a human invention conferred by the self-serving interests of the sensually impoverished.

Death is finite, discernible, and attendable. Its workers would go mad without a sense of humor.