Editor’s Note

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Notes

[1] There is some difference of opinion about when this letter was written. Shannon (1985) lists November 27, 1958 (p. 436), and Smith (1969) gives the same date (p. 862), as does Mott (1984, p. 629), but Merton (1996, p. 231), in his journals for November 18, 1958, says he wrote to Huxley the day before, that is, November 17. The error might be due to the various authors’/editors’ confusion with an earlier letter Merton had written to Huxley on November 27 (1941).

[2] Merton was 26 at the time and associated with Catherine de Hueck’s Friendship House in Harlem. He had written an article on Huxley for Catholic World after which Huxley wrote to Merton sending in the envelope $5 for Friendship House. Merton felt uneasy about some of the things he had said about Huxley such as “Huxley, as a philosopher, is not distinguished.” Merton (1995, p. 453), who was full of himself at the time, said he had “made many glib individual statements which I would gladly eat.”

[3] By psychedelic drugs—part of a larger class known as hallucinogens—I am referring specifically to lysergic acid (LSD), mescaline, psilocybin, LSA, Ayahuasca (yagé), MDMA (ecstasy), and marijuana among others. For how drugs affect the mind and body, see, for example, Rosen and Weil (2004).

[4] Not surprisingly, at this time, Zaehner (1957) engages in gobbledygook distinctions between natural and supernatural mystical experiences. He speaks of Huxley’s The Doors of Perception engaging in what he describes as a “mild criticism of Mr. Huxley’s more extravagant conclusions” (pp. xii–xiii). He was converted to Catholicism in 1948, and from the basis of a Roman Catholic religious ethic, his world view on two distinct varieties of mystical experiences is developed.

[5] Garrrigou‐Lagrange’s (1938) seminal work was The Three Ages of the Interior Life: Prelude of Eternal Life. The theologian had taught many prominent Catholic theologians over the years, including Pope John Paul II.

[6] Coincidentally or otherwise, it was the same year (1953) that the CIA conducted research on mescaline at the Naval Medical Research Institute in Bethesda, Maryland in the U.S. government’s attempt to find a drug that could be used effectively as a chemical weapon to advance its interests in the cold war. It is often forgotten or not known that the S.S. and Gestapo conducted experiments on the effects of mescaline on prisoners at Dachau during World War II. For great insights into governmental excursions into human consciousness warfare as well as the history of the use of psychedelics, I suggest the following six fine works among the multitude of fine works available: Aaronson and Osmond (1971), Huxley (1977), Leary, Metzner, and Alpert (1964), Lee (1985), Marks (1979), and Solomon (1964).

[7] The title of Huxley’s book was inspired by William Blake’s The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, where Blake says, “If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things through narrow chinks of his cavern” (see http://www.levity.com/alchemy/blake_ma.html); the young poet/singer Jim Morrison named his rock and roll band “The Doors” after The Doors of Perception and frequently quoted from the work.

[8] It struck me, while putting this note together, that there might be young and old alike who do not know what mescaline is. Mescaline (3,4,5‐trimethoxyphenethylamine) is a hallucinogen that can be found naturally in the peyote cactus (Lophophora williamsii), San Pedro cactus (Echinopsis pachanoi), the Peruvian Torch cactus (Echinopsis peruviana), and a number of other members of the Cactaceae, or can be produced synthetically. It was first isolated and identified in 1896 by the German Arthur Heffter and was the first such drug to be synthesized—in 1919 by Ernst Späth. The drug has been with us for centuries; the earliest known depiction of the San Pedro cactus is on a stone tablet found in Peru dating to 1300 BC. Ritual objects containing images of Peyote have been found dating back to 500 BC. The introduction of Peyote into the U.S. and Canada, and its use by North American Indian tribes, occurred much more recently, beginning sometime in the late 1800s. As with mushrooms, the Roman Catholic church tried to abolish the use of Peyote and San Pedro. As the use of peyote spread from Mexico to North America, the Native American Church was formed in 1918 to preserve Native Americans’ right to use Peyote. And with San Pedro, the ceremony practiced by many South American shamans continued while incorporating several Christian symbols into the rituals. Ironically, the name of a Christian saint was even adopted for the cactus. The Drug Enforcement Administration has both peyote and mescaline listed as Schedule I hallucinogens; I will not dignify this indignity with naming the penalties that come from their use. Mescaline is generally taken orally but, as in the case of LSD, it may be injected. The average dose of 350–500 mg will yield a high lasting 5–12 hr. Because of its bitter taste, mescaline is often taken with beverages such as tea, coffee, milk, orange juice, soda, or soft drink. The peyote button itself has a vile, fibrous taste and for many results in minor vomiting, perhaps because its white hairs contain strychnine. Mescaline is not as potent as LSD but causes similar hallucinogenic effects.

[9] The Confessions of an English Opium‐Eater first appeared in book form in 1822, making its debut the previous year in the London Magazine. The text describes the author’s experiences with opium from his very first encounter to his severe hallucinatory‐based addiction later in life. Understandably, the stanchions of the Victorian Era did not take well to such vivid accounts of drug use. Burroughs’ Junkie was first published in 1953 by Ace Books in New York.

[10] During their travel to a remove village in Mexico in 1953, amateur mycologists, Banker Wasson, a retired Vice‐President of J. P. Morgan and Company, and his wife Valentina, were introduced to the hallucinatory “sacred mushrooms” (Psilocybe Mexicana) by Mazatec shaman Maria Sabina. The May 27, 1957 edition of Life magazine printed an extensive feature story on their ventures. For an ethnographic account of their ventures in Mexico and Russia, see the now classic Wasson and Wasson (1957).

[11] Bergson (1935) speaks of William James’ illuminations through his experiments with nitrous oxide (for which many of James’ colleagues chided or mocked him), indicating that “The psychological disposition was there, potentially, only wanting a signal to express itself in action. It might have been evoked spiritually by an effort made on his own spiritual level. But it could just as well be brought about materially, by an inhibition of what inhibited it, by the removing of that obstacle; and this effect was the wholly negative one produced by the drug.” (cited in Huxley, 1977).

[12] Merton’s view of the distinction between the natural and the supernatural began to dissolve in 1965, when he corresponded with Marco Pallis, a Greek who has studied Tibetan spirituality and culture and whose insightful Peaks and Lamas (London: Cassell) appeared in 1939. Pallis had written Merton a 26‐page handwritten letter in January 1965 (see http://www.merton.org/Research/Correspondence/z.asp?id=1550) in which he criticized the monk’s distinction between “natural” and “supernatural” religion. Writing back, Merton said he was ready to face the music, to give up the distinction he had made between natural and supernatural mysticism, calling the distinction “misleading and unsatisfactory … the whole business of natural and supernatural requires a great deal of study,” which he says twice (Shannon, 1985, p. 470). It was too late to pick up his conversation with Huxley regarding these matters because Huxley had died 2 years earlier, administered a dose of LSD on his deathbed (Huxley, 1968).

[13] In the early 1950s, Cary Grant began taking LSD under the guidance of Dr. Mortimer Hartmann and later with Dr. Oscar Janiger. He felt such relief that he became an exhilarated spokesperson for its benefits. See Geller and Boas (1969), McCann (1996), and Cary Grant: Biography, films, and DVDs. http://www.cosmopolis.ch/english/cosmo14/carygrant.htm.

[14] Leary (1983) relates that he was taking LSD every day for an extended period of time.

[15] And the kind of book that might be used in such a course is Inciardi (1990). Publicity for the book states that Inciardi “offers a useful way of thinking about the problem, which, while not a solution in itself, provides the tools necessary to develop a realistic and effective national drug policy.” It is written for criminal justice mechanics.

[16] See Foucault (1977).