Little Poems in Prose

XXI THE TEMPTATIONS: OR, LOVE, RICHES AND GLORY TWO superb Satans and a She-Devil not less remarkable than they, last night climbed the mysterious staircase by which Hell emerges to assault the weakness of a sleeping man, and secretly communicates with him. In their glory they came as it were erect upon a platform and stood in front of me. A sulphur- ous splendour emanated from these three mighty Beings, cutting them from the thick darkness of the night. So proud and so master- ful was their manner that at first I took them to be indeed gods. The face of the first Satan was epicene, and he had also in every line of his body the soft- ness of old Bacchus. Lovely were his eyes, and languishing, of a shadowy and undecided col- our, resembling violets still wetted with the heavy tears of the storm, and his half-opened