THE INQUISITION THE DEVIL'S MASTERPIECE.

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Devil in them, nor are they much acquainted with him, and yet he serves himself of them; whether of their folly, or of that other frailty called wit, it is all one, he makes them do his work when they think they are doing their own; nay, so cunning is he in his guiding the weak part of the world, that even when they think they are serving God, they are doing nothing less or more than serving the Devil; nay, it is some of the nicest part of his operation to make them believe they are serving God when they do his work. Thus, those who the Scripture foretold should persecute Christ's church in the latter days, were to think they did God good service; thus the Inquisition, for example, it may be, at this time, in all the acts of Christian cruelty which they are so famous for, if any of them are ignorant enough not to know that they are devils incarnate, they may, for aught we know, go on for God's sake; torture, murder, starve to death, mangle, and macerate, and all for God, and God's catholic church; and it is certainly the Devil's master-piece to bring mankind to such a perfection of devilism as that of the Inquisition is, for, if the Devil had not been in them, could they christen such a hellfire judicature as the Inquisition is by the name of the Holy Office? And so in paganism; how could so many nations among the poor Indians offer human sacrifices to their idols, and murder thousands of men, women, and children, to appease this god of the air when he is angry, if the Devil did not act in them under the visor of devotion?

But we need not go to America, or to the Inquisition, nor to paganism, or to popery either, to look for people that are sacrificing to the Devil, or that give their peace-offerings to him while they are offered upon God's altar; are not our churches (aye, and meeting-houses, too, as much as they pretend to be more sanctified than their neighbours) full of Devil-worshippers? where do his devotees gratulate one another, and congratulate him, more than at church? where, while they hold up their hands, and turn up their eyes towards heaven, they make all their vows to Satan, or, at least, to the fair devils, his representatives, which I shall speak of in their place.

Do not the sons of God, make assignations with the daughters of men, in the very house of worship? do they not talk to them in the language of the eyes? and what is at the bottom of it, while one eye is upon the prayer-book, and the

other adjusting their dress? are they not sacrificing to Venus and Mercury, nay, and to the very Devil they dress at.

Let any man impartially survey the church gestures, the air, the postures, and the behaviour; let him keep an exact roll, and if I do not show him two Devil-worshippers for one true saint, then the word saint must have another signification than I ever yet understood it by.

The church as a place, is the receptacle of the dead, as well as the assembly of the living; what relates to those below, I doubt Satan, if he would be so kind, could give a better account of than I can; but as to the superficies, I pretend to so much penetration as to tell you, that there are more spectres, more apparitions always there, than you, that know nothing of the matter, may be aware of.

I happened to be at an eminent place of God's most devout worship the other day, with a gentleman of my acquaintance, who, I observed, minded very little the business he ought to come about; first I saw him always busy staring about him, and bowing this way and that way; nay, he made two or three bows and scrapes when he was repeating the responses to the Ten Commandments, and, I assure you, he made it correspond strangely, so that the harmony was not so broken in upon as you would expect it should; thus: Lord—and a bow to a fine lady, just come up to her seat have mercy upon us;-three bows to a throng of ladies that came into the next pew altogether-and incline-then stopped to make a great scrape to my lord our hearts-just then the hearts of all the church were gone off from the subject, for the response was over, so he huddled up the rest in whisper, for God a'mighty could hear him well enough, he said, nay, as well as if he had spoken as loud as his neighbours did.

After we were come home, I asked him what he meant by all this, and what he thought of it.

How could I help it? said he; I must not be rude.
What? says I; rude to who?

Why, says he, there came in so many she-devils, I could not help it.

What, said I, could you not help bowing when you were saying your prayers?

O, sir, says he, the ladies would have thought I had slighted them; I could not avoid it.

Ladies! said I, I thought you called them devils just now.

ANECDOTE ON ETIQUETTE AT CHURCH.

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Ay, ay, devils, said he, little charming devils; but 1 must not be rude to them, however.

Very well, said I, then you would be rude to God a'mighty, because you could not be rude to the Devil?

Why, that is true, said he; but what can we do? there is no going to church, as the case stands now, if we must not worship the Devil a little between whiles.

This is the case, indeed, and Satan carries his point on every hand; for if the fair-speaking, world, and the fair-looking world, are generally devils, that is to say, are in his management, we are sure the foul-speaking and the foul-doing world are all on his side; and you are then only the fair-doing part of the world that are out of his class, and when we speak of them, O, how few!

But I return to the Devil's managing our wicked part, for this he does with most exquisite subtlety; and this is one part of it, viz., he thrusts our vices into our virtues, by which he mixes the clean and the unclean, and thus by the corruption of the one, poisons and debauches the other; that the slave he governs cannot account for his own common actions, and is fain to be obliged to his Maker to accept of the heart without the hands and feet; to take, as we vulgarly express it, the will for the deed, and if heaven was not so good to come into that half-in-half service, I do not see but the Devil would carry away all his servants. Here, indeed, I should enter into a long detail of involuntary wickedness, which, in short, is neither more or less than the Devil in everybody, ay, in every one of you, our governors excepted, take it as you please.

What is our language when we look back with reflection and reproach on past follies? I think I was bewitched, I was possessed; certainly; the Devil was in me, or else I had never been such a sot. Devil in you sir! ay, who doubts it? you may be sure the Devil was in you, and there he is still, and next time he can catch you in the same snare, you will be just the same sot that you say you were before.

In short, the Devil is too cunning for us, and manages us his own way; he governs the vices of men by his own methods: though every crime will not make a man a devil, yet it must be owned that every crime puts the criminal in some measure into the Devil's power, gives him a title to the man, and he treats him magisterially ever after.

Some tell us every single man, every individual, has a

devil attending him, to execute the orders of the (grand seignior) devil of the whole clan; that this attending evil angel, for so he is called, sees every step you take, is with you in every action, prompts you to every mischief, and leaves you to do everything that is pernicious to yourself; they also allege that there is a good spirit which attends him too, which latter is always accessary to everything that we do that is good, and reluctant to evil; if this is true, how comes it to pass that those two opposite spirits do not quarrel about it when they are pressing us to contrary actions, one good and the other evil? and why does the evil tempting spirit so often prevail? Instead of answering this difficult question, I shall only tell you, as to this story of good and evil angels attending every particular person, it is a good allegory, indeed, to represent the struggle in the mind of man between good and evil inclinations; but as to the rest, the best thing I can say of it is, that I think it is a fib.

But to take things as they are, and only talk by way of natural consequence (for to argue from nature is certainly the best way to find out the Devil's story), if there are good and evil spirits attending us, that is to say, a good angel and a devil, then it is no unjust reproach upon anybody to say, when they follow the dictates of the latter, the Devil is in them; or they are devils; nay, I must carry it farther still, namely, that as the generality and greatest number of people do follow and obey the evil spirit and not the good, and that the predominate power is allowed to be the nominating power, you must then allow that, in short, the greater part of mankind has the Devil in them, and so I come to my text:

To this purpose give me leave to borrow a few lines of a friend on this very part of the Devil's management.

To places and persons he suits his disguises,

And dresses up all his banditti,

Who, as pickpockets flock to a country assizes,
Crowd up to the court and the city.

They're at every elbow and every ear,
And ready at every call, Sir;

The vigilant scout plants his agents about,
And has something to do with us all, Sir.

In some he has part, and in some he's the whole,
And of some (like the vicar of Baddow),
It can neither be said they have body or soul,
But only are devils in shadow.

SATAN'S MANAGEMENT IN THE PAGAN HIERARCHY. 463

The pretty and witty are devils in mask,
The beauties are mere apparitions ;
The homely alone by their faces are known,
And the good by their ugly conditions.

The beaus walk about like the shadows of men,
And wherever he leads 'em they follow,
But take 'em and shake 'em, there's not one in ten
But's as light as a feather, and hollow.

Thus all his affairs he drives on in disguise,

And he tickles mankind with a feather:

Creeps in at our ears, and looks out at our eyes,
And jumbles our senses together.

He raises the vapours, and prompts the desires,
And to ev'ry dark deed holds the candle;
The passions inflames and the appetite fires;
And takes ev'rything by the right handle.

Thus he walks up and down in complete masquerade,
And with every company mixes,

Sells in every shop, works at every trade,

And ev'rything doubtful perplexes.

How Satan comes by this governing influence in the minds and upon the actions of men, is a question I am not yet come to, nor indeed does it so particularly belong to the Devil's history; it seems rather a polemic, so it may pass at school among the metaphysics, and puzzle the heads of our masters; wherefore I think to write to the learned Dr. B. . . about it, imploring his most sublime haughtiness, that when his other more momentous avocations of pedantry and pedagogism will give him an interval from wrath and contention, he will set apart a moment to consider human nature devilized, and give us a mathematical, anatomical description of it; with a map of Satan's kingdom in the microcosm of mankind, and such other illuminations as to him and his contemporaries and &c., in their great wisdom shall seem meet.

CHAPTER V.

OF THE DEVIL'S MANAGEMENT IN THE PAGAN HIERARCHY BY OMENS, ENTRAILS, AUGURS, ORACLES, AND SUCH-LIKE PAGEANTRY OF HELL; AND HOW THEY WENT OFF THE STAGE AT LAST, BY THE INTRODUCTION OF TRUE RELIGION.

I HAVE adjourned, not finished my account of the Devil's Secret management by possession, and shall re-assume it, in