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 A MEMORABLE FANCY
Once I saw a Devil in a flame of
fire, who arose before an Angel that sat on a cloud, and the Devil utter'd these words.
The worship of God is, Honouring his gifts in other men each according to his genius, and
loving the greatest men best; those who envy or calumniate great men hate God, for there
is no other God.
The Angel hearing this became almost blue, but mastering himself he grew yellow, & at
last white pink & smiling, and then replied,
Thou Idolater, is not God One? & is not he visible in Jesus Christ? and has not Jesus
Christ given his sanction to the law often commandments, and are not all other men fools,
sinners, & nothings?
The Devil answer'd: bray a fool in a morter with wheat, yet shall not his folly be beaten
out of him; if Jesus Christ is the greatest man, you ought to love him in the greatest
degree; now hear how he has given his sanction to the law of ten commandments: did he not
mock at the sabbath, and so mock the sabbaths God? murder those who were murder'd because
of him? turn away the law from the woman taken in adultery? steal the labor of others to
support him? bear false witness when he omitted making a defence before Pilate? covet when
he pray'd for his disciples, and when he bid them shake off the dust of their feet against
such as refused to lodge them? I tell you, no virtue can exist without breaking these ten
commandments; Jesus was all virtue, and acted from impulse, not from rules.
When he had so spoken: I beheld the Angel who stretched out his arms embracing the flame
of fire, & he was consumed and arose as Elijah.
Note: This Angel, who is now become a Devil, is my particular friend;
we often read the Bible together in its infernal or diabolical sense which the world shall
have if they behave well.
I have also: The Bible of Hell: which the world shall have whether they will or no.
One Law for the Lion
& Ox is Oppression.
A SONG OF LIBERTY
1. The Eternal
Female groan'd! it was heard over all the Earth:
2. Albions coast is sick silent; the American meadows faint!
3. Shadows of Prophecy shiver along by the lakes and the rivers and mutter across the
ocean. France rend down thy dungeon;
4. Golden Spain burst the barriers of old Rome;
5. Cast thy keys O Rome into the deep down falling, even to eternity down falling,
6. And weep.
7. In her trembling hands she took the new born terror howling;
8. On those infinite mountains of light, now barr'd out by the atlantic sea, the new born
fire stood before the starry king!
9. Flag'd with grey brow'd snows and thunderous visages the jealous wings wav'd over the
deep.
10. The speary hand burned aloft, unbuckled was the shield, forth went the hand of
jealousy among the flaming hair, and hurl'd the new born wonder thro' the starry night.
11. The fire, the fire, is falling!
12. Look up! look up! O citizen of London, enlarge thy countenance; O Jew, leave counting
gold! return to thy oil and wine; O African! black African! (go, winged thought, widen his
forehead.)
13. The fiery limbs, the flaming hair, shot like the sinking sun into the western sea.
14 Wak'd from his eternal sleep, the hoary element roaring fled away;
I5. Down rush'd beating his wings in vain the jealous king; his grey brow'd councellors,
thunderous warriors, curl'd veterans, among helms, and shields, and chariots, horses,
elephants: banners, castles, slings, and rocks,
I6. Falling, rushing, ruining! buried in the ruins, on Urthona's dens;
17. All night beneath the ruins, then their sullen flames faded emerge round the gloomy
King.
18. With thunder and fire: leading his starry hosts thro' the waste wilderness, he
promulgates his ten commands, glancing: his beamy eyelids over the deep in dark dismay,
19. Where the son of fire in his eastern cloud, while the morning plumes her Golden
breast,
20. Spurning the clouds written with curses, stamps the stony law to dust, loosing: the
eternal horses from the dens of night, crying. Empire is no more! and now the lion &
wolf shall cease.
Chorus
Let the Priests of
the Raven of dawn, no longer in deadly black, with hoarse note curse the sons of joy. Nor
his accepted brethren, whom tyrant, he calls free: lay the bound or build the roof. Nor
pale religious letchery call that virginity, that wishes but acts not! For every thing
that lives is Holy.
The End
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