Over the past dozen years or more, Israel Regardie and I have often chatted, about topics ranging from psychology to philosophy, politics to religion, and occultism to mysticism in all of its various forms. Some of his attitudes towards these topics have been incorporated in various of his writings, others are not so well known.One Saturday afternoon, not long ago, while visiting him in his home in the mountains of Arizona, it was my intention to interview him and delve into some of his other more basic attitudes. He turned out not to be an easy man to interview. In fact, he is a very private person. But as we talked, each of us with a drink - mine being burgundy and his a bloody Mary - he was finally persuaded to relax his interdiction against interviews. The cassette recorder had been prepared in advance and the interview opened in a rather light, breezy manner. This book is the result of that interview. The editing has been minimal, primarily to eliminate redundancy. The photographs scattered throughout this text were shot a few days after the recording. It is my conviction that this work reveals his honesty, integrity and sincerity. This work shows him as a hard-hitting, capable and enthusiastic upholder of those values he regarded as important and true. They range far and wide. I fancy devoted readers of his other books will find this particular work valuable, as most revealing of the author whom they have learned to respect, since his first book appeared over fifty years ago. - Christopher S. Hyatt