THE SATANIC IN LITERATURE.
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creditable; but an analysis of the most comical characters of Shakespeare or Dickens will reveal a large alloy of deviltry. Mischief is first cousin to Momus. "Old Knick" always has fun at his "table." There is an infirmity in our nature which likes this flavor of sin in the wine of life; it may be because it prefers the joking to the earnest devil. Many never think of him without a chuckle, or talk of him without a joke. The majority will enjoy the Devil's Drive of Byron better than his Lucifer, and the Devil's Thoughts with Coleridge much better than Satan's speeches to his fallen comrades. Coleridge has happily seen the laughing side, and catches this view of him when he sings,
"From his brimstone bed at break of day
A-walking the devil is gone,
To visit his snug little farm, the earth,
And see how his stock goes on.
"Over the hill and over the dale,
And he went over the plain,
And backward and forward he switched his long tail,
As a gentleman switches his cane,
"He saw a lawyer killing a viper
On a dung-hill hard by his own stable;
And the devil smiled, for it put him in mind
Of Cain and his brother Able.
"He saw an apothecary on a white horse
Ride by on his vocations,
And the devil thought of this old friend,
Death in the Revelations.
"He saw a cottage with a double coach-house,
A cottage of gentility,
And the devil did grin, for his darling sin
Is pride which apes humility.
"He pooped into a rich bookseller's shop,
Quoth he, 'We are both of one college:
For I sate myself like a cormorant, once
Hard by the tree of knowledge."
A-walking the devil is gone,
To visit his snug little farm, the earth,
And see how his stock goes on.
"Over the hill and over the dale,
And he went over the plain,
And backward and forward he switched his long tail,
As a gentleman switches his cane,
"He saw a lawyer killing a viper
On a dung-hill hard by his own stable;
And the devil smiled, for it put him in mind
Of Cain and his brother Able.
"He saw an apothecary on a white horse
Ride by on his vocations,
And the devil thought of this old friend,
Death in the Revelations.
"He saw a cottage with a double coach-house,
A cottage of gentility,
And the devil did grin, for his darling sin
Is pride which apes humility.
"He pooped into a rich bookseller's shop,
Quoth he, 'We are both of one college:
For I sate myself like a cormorant, once
Hard by the tree of knowledge."
