Wicca, the religion, is an exercise in metaphysics to a certain degree. As such it progresses through ontology, cosmology, and espistemoly. How it is percieved by its extremely varied practioners depends largely on the metaphors they were exposed to. The tool we use to pass things on is language which is not all that exact. Much of how we relate to words comes from how they have been used in context in relation to us personally. A key word in the dialoge that proceeded this post is "experiential". Metaphorically speaking I like to consider people to be in two very general catagories, small and large box builders. The first catagory likes to create small "safe" mental inclosures where the basic tenants of a concept will encounter a minimum of resistance and/or challenge. The second catagory of people work at pushing out the boundaries of the box they have found themselves inheriting. And, yes, I believe that Gardner belonged to the second catagory. Within the magickal meta-paradigm there is an old concept of "The Great Work of Art". I suspect that Gardner recognized this concept and applied himself to it. From an observable point in consensus reality the Universe appears to be about Change and what that yields, Diversity. Because of this everbody is unique. This includes how we relate to "Illumination", hopefully an ongoing cycle stemming from "Initiation". In the metaphysical sense this can be viewed as a process that goes: change, crisis, transcendence, tranformation, and predispositon to further change. How this effects and affects an individual is also unique. It often lacks metaphors, hence the "mysteries". We are now back to that key word "experiential".