Heaven & Hell

From the d.j.: "Heaven and Hell" is a companion volume to Mr. Huxley's challenging book "The Doors of Perception", and it will be read and argued about with no less eagerness than its predecessor. Mr. Huxley is concerned here with "the supreme truth that perception...can be the same as Revelation". Visionary power, attained once by fasting and mortification, can be achieved today through certain drugs, through hypnosis, or the stroboscopic lamp. The experimenter finds himself in an unexplored New World of the mind, the Antipodes of his normal conscious living, whose properties have a heightened significance, a pure intrinsic value. This world can have the characteristics of the Paradise or the Fairyland of religion and folk-lore; but negative emotions--fear, hatred, anger or malice--will turn this heaven into a hell." In addition to the main essay, there are 8 fascinating appendices.