Даниэль Дефо
The History of the Devil, As Well Ancient as Modern: In Two Parts
The bringing Mankind thus to War and Confusion, as it was the first Game the Devil play’d after the confounding of Languages and Divisions at Babel so it was a Conquest upon Mankind, purely devilish, born from Hell, and so exactly tinctured with Satan’s original Sin Ambition, that it really transform’d Men into meer Devils; for when is Man transform’d into the very Image of Satan himself, when is he turn’d into a meer Devil, if it is not when he is fighting with his fellow Creatures and dipping his Hands in the Blood of his own Kind? Let his Picture be consider’d, the Fire of Hell flames or sparkles in his Eyes, a voracious Grin sits upon his Countenance; Rage and Fury distort the Muscles of his Face; his Passions agitate his whole Body, and he is metamorphos’d from a comely Beauteous angelic Creature into a Fury, a Satyr, a terrible and frightful Monster, nay, into a Devil; for Satan himself is describ’d by the same Word which on his very Account is chang’d into a Substantive, and the Devils are call’d Furies.
This sowing the Seeds of Strife in the World, and bringing Nations to fight and make War upon one another, would take up a great Part of the Devil’s History, and abundance of extraordinary Things would occur in relating the particulars; for there have been very great Conflagrations kindled in the World, by the Artifice of Hell, under this Head, (viz.) of making War; in which it has been the Devil’s Master-piece, and he has indeed shewn himself a Workman in it, that he has wheedled Mankind into strange unnatural Notions of things, in order to propagate and support the fighting Principle in the World; such as Laws of War, fair Fighting, behaving like Men of Honour, fighting at the last Drop, and the like, by which killing and murdering is understood to be justifiable. Virtue and a true Greatness in Spirit is rated now by Rules which God never appointed, and the Standard of Honour is quite different from that of Reason and of Nature: Bravery is denominated not from a fearless undaunted Spirit in the just Defence of Life and Liberty, but from a daring Defiance of God and Man, fighting, killing and treading under Foot his fellow Creatures, at the ordinary Command of the Officer, whether it be right or wrong, and whether it be in a just Defence of Life, and our Country’s Life, that is Liberty, or whether it be for the Support of Injury and Oppression.
A prudent avoiding causeless Quarrels is call’d Cowardice, and to take an affront Baseness, and Meanness of Spirit; to refuse fighting, and putting Life at a Cast on the Point of a Sword, a Practice forbid by the Laws of God and of all good Government, is yet call’d Cowardice; and a Man is bound to die duelling, or live and be laugh’d at.
This trumping up these imaginary Things call’d Bravery and Gallantry, naming them Virtue and Honour, is all from the Devil’s new Management, and his subtil influencing the Minds of Men to fly in the Face of God and Nature, and to act against his Senses; nor but for his Artifice in the Management, could it be possible that such Inconsistencies could go down with Mankind, or they could pass such absurd Things among them for reasoning; for Example, A is found in Bed with B’s Wife, B is the Person injur’d, and therefore offended, and coming into the Chamber with his Sword in his Hand, A exclaims loudly, Why Sir, you won’t murder me, will you? as you are a Man of Honour let me rise and take my Sword.
A very good Story indeed! fit for no body but the Devil to put into any Man’s Head; But so it is, B being put in mind, forsooth, that he is a Man of Honour, starts back and must act the honourable Part; so he lets A get up, put on his Clothes and take his Sword; then they fight, and B is kill’d for his Honour; whereas had the Laws of God, of Nature and of Reason taken Place, the Adulterer and the Adulteress should have been taken Prisoners and carried before the Judge, and being taken in the Fact, should have been immediately sentenc’d, he to the Block and she to the Stake, and the innocent abus’d Husband had no Reason to have run any Risque of his Life for being made a Cuckold.
But thus has Satan abus’d the Reason of Man; and if a Man does me the greatest Injury in the World, I must do my self Justice upon him, by venturing my life upon an even Lay with him, and must fight him upon equal Hazard, in which the injur’d Person is as often kill’d as the Person offering the Injury: Suppose now it be in the same Case as above, a Man abuses my Wife, and then to give me Satisfaction, tells me, he will fight me, which the French call doing me Reason; No Sir, say I, let me lie with your Wife too, and then if you desire it, I may fight you; then I am upon even Terms with you; but this indeed is the Reasoning which the Devil has brought Mankind too at this Day: But to go back to the Subject, viz. the Devil bringing the Nations to fall out, and to quarrel for Room in the World, and so to fight in order to dispossess one another of their Settlements: This began at a Time when certainly there were Places enough in the World for every one to choose in, and therefore the Devil, not the want of Elbow-room, must be the Occasion of it; and ’tis carried on ever since, as apparently from the same Interest, and by the same original.
But we shall meet with this Part again very often in the Devil’s Story, and as we bring him farther on in the Management of Mankind, I therefore lay it by for the Present, and come to the next Steps the Devil took with Mankind after the Confusion of Languages, and this was in the Affair of Worship; It does not appear yet that ever the Devil was so bold, as either,
1. To set himself up to be worship’d as a God, or which was still worse,
2. To persuade Man to believe there was no God at all to worship.
Both these are introduc’d since the Deluge, one indeed by the Devil, who soon found Means to set himself up for a God in many Parts of the World, and holds it to this Day; but the last is brought in by the Invention of Man, in which it must be confess’d Man has out-sin’d the Devil; for to do Satan justice, he never thought it could ever pass upon Mankind, or that any Thing so gross would go down with them; so that, in short, these modern Casuists, in the Reach of our Days, have, I say, out-sin’d the Devil.
As then both these are modern Inventions, Satan went on gradually, and being to work upon human Nature by Stratagem, not by Force, it would have been too gross to have set himself up as an Object of Worship at first, it was to be done Step by Step; for Example.
1. It was sufficient to bring Mankind to a Neglect of God, to worship him by halves, and give little or no Regard to his Laws, and so grow loose and immoral, in direct Contradiction to his Commands; this would not go down with them at first, so the Devil went on gradually.
2. From a Negligence in worshiping the true God, he by Degrees introduc’d the worship of false Gods; and to introduce this he began with the Sun, Moon, and Stars, call’d in the holy Text the Host of Heaven; these had greater Majesty upon them, and seem’d fitter to command the Homage of Mankind; so it was not the hardest Thing in the World, to bring Men, when they had once forgotten the true God, to embrace the Worship of such Gods as those.
3. Having thus debauch’d their Principles in Worship, and led them from the true and only Object of Worship to a false, it was the easier to carry them on; so in a few Gradations more he brought them to downright Idolatry, and even in that Idolatry he proceeded gradually too; for he began with awful Names, such as were venerable in the Thoughts of Men, as Baal or Bell, which, in Chaldaick and Hebrew, signifies Lord or Sovereign, or Mighty and Magnificent, and this was therefore a Name ascrib’d at first to the true God; but afterwards they descended to make Images and Figures to represent him, and then they were call’d by the same Name, as Baal, Baalim, and afterwards Bell; from which, by a hellish Degeneracy, Saturn brought Mankind to adore every Block of their own hewing, and to worshipping Stocks, Stones, Monsters, Hobgoblins, and every sordid frightful Thing, and at last the Devil himself.
What Notions some People may entertain of the Forwardness of the first Ages of the World, to run into Idolatry, I do not enquire here; I know they tell us strange Things, of its being the Product of meer Nature, one remove from its primitive State; but I, who pretend to have so critically enquir’d into Satan’s History, can assure you, and that from very good Authority, that the Devil did not find it so easy a task to obliterate the Knowledge of the true God, in the Minds and Consciences of Men, as those People suggest.
It is true he carried Things a great Length under the Patriarchal Government of the first Ages, but still he was sixteen hundred Years bringing it to pass; and tho’ we have Reason to believe the old World, before the Flood was arrived to a very great Height of Wickedness, and Ovid very nobly describes it by the War of the Titans against Jupiter, yet we do not read that ever Satan was come to such a Length as to bring them to Idolatry; indeed we do read of Wars carried on among them, whether it was one Nation against another, or only Personal, we cannot tell; But the World seem’d to be swallow’d up in a Life of Wickedness, that is to say, of Luxury and Lewdness, Rapine and Violence, and there were Giants among them, and Men of Renown, that is to say, Men fam’d for their mighty Valour, great Actions of War we may suppose, and their Strength, who personally oppos’d others. We read of no considerable Wars indeed, but ’tis not to be doubted but there was such Wars, or else it is to be understood that they liv’d (in common) a Life somewhat like the Brutes, the Strong devouring the Weak; for the Text says, the whole Earth was filled with Violence, hunting and tearing one another in Pieces, either for Dominion or for Wealth, either for Ambition or for Avarice, we know not well which.
Thus far the old Antediluvian World went, and very wicked they were, there is no doubt of that; but we have Reason to believe that was no Idolatry, the Devil had not brought them to that Length yet: perhaps it would soon have follow’d, but the Deluge interven’d.
After the Deluge, as I have said, he had all his Work to do over again, and he went on by the same Steps; first he brought them to Violence and War, then to Oppression and Tyranny, then to neglect of true Worship, then to false worship, and then Idolatry by the meer natural Consequence of the Thing; who were the first Nation or People that fell from the Worship of the true God, is something hard to determine; the Devil, who certainly of all God’s Creatures is best able to inform us, having left us nothing upon Record upon that Subject, but we have Reason to believe it was thus introduc’d.
Nimrod was the Grandson of Ham, Noah’s second Son, the same who was cursed by his Father for exposing him in his Drunkenness: This Nimrod was the first who it seems Satan pick’d out for a Hero: Here he inspir’d him with ambitious Thoughts, dreams of Empire, and having the Government of all the Rest, that is to say, universal Monarchy; the very same Bait with which he has plaid upon the Frailty of Princes, and ensnar’d the greatest of them ever since, even from his most August Imperial Majesty King Nimrod the first, to his most Christian Majesty Louis the XIV. and many a mighty Monarch between.
When these mighty Monarchs and Men of Fame went off the Stage, the World had their Memories in esteem many Ages after; and as their great Actions were no otherwise recorded than by oral Tradition, and the Tongues and Memories of fallible Men, Time and the Custom of magnifying the past Actions of Kings, Men soon fabl’d up their Histories, Satan assisting, into Miracle and Wonder: Hence their Names were had in Veneration more and more; Statues and Bustoes representing their Persons and great Actions were set up in public Places, till from Heroes and Champions they made Gods of them, and thus (Satan prompting) the World was quickly fill’d with Idols.
This Nimrod is he, who according to the received Opinion, tho’ I do not find Satan’s History exactly concurring with it, was first call’d Belus, then Baal, and worship’d in most of the eastern Countries under those Names; sometimes with Additions of Sir-names, according to the several countries, or People, or Towns where he was particularly set up, as Baal Peor, Baal Zephon, Baal Phegor, and in other Places plain Baal, as Jupiter in after Times had the like Additions; as Jupiter Ammon, Jupiter Capitolinus, Jupiter Pistor, Jupiter Feretrius, and about ten or twelve Jupiters more.
I must acknowledge, that I think it was a Master-piece of Hell to bring the World to Idolatry so soon after they had had such an eminent Example of the infinite Power of the true God, as was seen in the Deluge, and particularly in the Escape of Noah in the Ark, to bring them (even before Noah or his Sons were dead) to forget whose Hand it was, and give the Homage of the World to a Name, and that a Name of a mortal Man dead and rotten, who was famous for nothing when he was alive but Blood and War; I say, to bring the World to set up this Nothing, this meer Name, nay the very Image and Picture of him for a God, it was first a Mark of most prodigious Stupidity in the whole Race of Men, a monstrous Degeneracy from Nature, and even from common Sense; and in the next Place ’twas a token of an inexpressible Craft and Subtilty in the Devil, who had now gotten the People into so full and compleat a Management, that in short, he could have brought them, by the same Rule, to have worship’d any thing; and in a little while more, did bring many of them to worship himself, plain Devil as he was, and knowing him to be such.
As to the Antiquity of this horrible Defection of Mankind, tho’ we do not find the beginning of it particularly recorded, yet we are certain it was not long after the Confusion of Babel; for Nimrod, as is said, was no more than Noah’s great Grandson and Noah himself, I suppose, might be alive some Years after Nimrod was born; and as Nimrod was not long dead, before they forgot that he was a Tyrant and a Murtherer, and made a Baal, that is a Lord or Idol of him, I say, he was not long dead, for Nimrod was born in the Year of the World 1847, and built Babylon the Year 1879; and we find Terah the Father of Abraham, who liv’d from the Year 1879 was an Idolater, as was doubtless Bethuel, who was Terah’s Grandson; for we find Laban, who was Bethuel’s Son, was so, and all this was during the Life of the first Post-Diluvian Family, for Terah was born within one hundred ninety three Years after the Flood, and one hundred fifty seven Years before Noah was dead; and even Abram himself was eight and fifty Years old before Noah died, and yet Idolatry had been then, in all probability, above an hundred Years practised in the World.
N. B. It is worth Remark here, what a terrible Advantage the Devil gain’d by the debauching poor Noah, and drawing him into the Sin of Drunkenness; for by this, as I said, he silenc’d and stop’d the Mouth of the great Preacher of Righteousness, that Father and Patriarch of the whole World, who not being able for the Shame of his own foul Miscarriage, to pretend to instruct or reprove the World any more, the Devil took hold of them immediately, and for want of a Prophet to warn and admonish, ran that little of Religion which there might be left in Shem and Japhet, quite out of the World, and delug’d them all in Idolatry.
How long the whole World may be said to be thus overwhelm’d in Ignorance and Idolatry, we may make some tolerable guess at by the History of Abraham; for it was not till God call’d him from his Father’s House, that any such Thing as a Church was establish’d in the World; nor even then, except in his own Family and Successors for almost four hundred Years after that Call; and till God brought the Israelites back out of Egypt, the whole World may be said to be involv’d in Idolatry and Devil worship.
So absolute a Conquest had the Devil made over Mankind immediately after the Flood, and all taking its Rise and Beginning at the fatal Defeat of Noah, who had he liv’d untainted and invulnerable, as he had done for six hundred Years before, would have gone a great way to have stem’d the Torrent of Wickedness which broke in upon Mankind; and therefore the Devil, I say, was very cunning and very much in the Right of it, take him as he is a meer Devil, to attack Noah personally, and give him a Blow so soon.
It is true, the Devil did not immediately raze out the Notion of Religion and of a God from the Minds of Men, nor could he easily suppress the Principle of Worship and Homage to be paid to a Sovereign Being, the Author of Nature and Guide of the World; the Devil saw this clearly in the first Ages of the new World, and therefore, as I have said, he proceeded politically and by Degrees: That it was so, is evident from the Story of Job and his three Friends, who, if we may take it for a History, not a Fable, and may judge of the Time of it by the Length of Job’s Life, and by the Family of Eliphaz the Temanite, who it is manifest was at least Grandson or Great Grandson to Esau Isaac’s eldest Son, and by the Language of Abimilech King of Gerar to Abraham, and of Laban to Jacob, both the Latter being at the same Time Idolaters; I say, if we may judge of it by all these, there were still very sound Notions of Religion in the Minds of Men; nor could Satan with all his Cunning and Policy deface those Ideas, and root them out of the Minds of the People.
And this put him upon taking new Measures to keep up his Interest and preserve the Hold he got upon Mankind; and his Method was like himself, subtle and politick to the last Degree, as his whole History makes appear; for seeing he found they could not but believe the Being of a God, and that they would needs worship something, it is evident, he had no Game left him to play but this, namely, to set up wrong Notions of Worship, and bring them to a false Worship instead of a True, supposing the Object worship’d to be still the same.
To finish this Stratagem, he first insinuates that the true God was a terrible, a dreadful, unapproachable Being; that to see him was so frightful, that it would be present Death; that to worship him immediately, was a Presumption which would provoke his Wrath; and that as he was a consuming Fire in himself, so he would burn up those in his Anger that dar’d to offer up any Sacrifice to him, but by the Interposition of some Medium which might receive their Adorations in his Name.
Hence it occur’d presently, that subordinate Gods were to be found out and set up, to whom the People might pay the Homage due to the supreme God, and who they might worship in his Name; this I take from the most ancient Account of Idolatry in the World; nor indeed could the Devil himself find out any other Reason why Men should Cannonise or rather Deify their Princes and Men of Fame, and worship them after they were dead, as if they could save them from Death and Calamity, who were not able to save themselves when they were alive; much less could Satan bring Men to swallow so gross, so absurd a Thing as the bowing the Knee to a Stock or a Stone, a Calf, an Ox, a Lion, nay the Image or Figure of a Calf, such as the Israelites made at Mount Sinai, and say, These be thy Gods, O Israel, who brought thee out of the Land of Egypt.
Having thus, I say, brought them to satisfy themselves that they worship’d the true God and no other, under the Figures and Appearances which they made to represent him, it was easy after that to worship any thing for the true God; and thus in a few Ages they worship’d nothing but Idols, even throughout the whole World; nor has the Devil lost this hold in some Parts of the World, nay not in most Parts of the World to this Day; He holds still all the Eastern Parts of Asia, and the Southern Parts of Africa, and the Northern Parts of Europe, and in them the vast Countries of China and Tartary, Persia and India, Guinea, Ethiopia, Zanquebar, Congo, Angola, Monomotapa, &c. in all which, except Ethiopia, we find no Vestiges of any other worship but that of Idols, Monsters, and even the Devil himself; till after the very coming of our Saviour, and even then, if it be true that the Gospel was preach’d in the Indies and China by St. Thomas, and in other remote Countries by other of the Apostles; we see that whatever Ground Satan lost, he seems to have recovered it again; and all Asia and Africa is at present overrun with Paganism or Mahometanism, which I think of the two is rather the worst; Besides all America, a Part of the World, as some say, equal in Bigness to all the other, in which the Devil’s Kingdom was never interrupted from its first being inhabited, whenever it was, to the first Discovery of it by the European Nations in the sixteenth Century.
In a Word, the Devil got what we may call an entire Victory over Mankind, and drove the Worship of the true God, in a Manner quite out of the World, forcing, as it were, his Maker in a new kind of Creation, the old one proving thus ineffectual to recover a certain Number by Force and meer Omnipotence to return to their Duty, serve him and worship him; But of that hereafter.
