The Devil's Thoughts

  1. 1From his brimstone bed at break of day
  2. 2A walking the Devil is gone,
  3. 3To visit his snug little farm the earth,
  4. 4And see how his stock goes on.
  1. 5Over the hill and over the dale,
  2. 6And he went over the plain,
  3. 7And backward and forward he switched his long tail
  4. 8As a gentleman switches his cane.
  1. 9And how then was the Devil drest?
  2. 10Oh! he was in his Sunday's best:
  3. 11His jacket was red and his breeches were blue,
  4. 12And there was a hole where the tail came through.
  1. 13He saw a Lawyer killing a Viper
  2. 14On a dunghill hard by his own stable;
  3. 15And the Devil smiled, for it put him in mind
  4. 16Of Cain and his brother, Abel.
  1. 17He saw an Apothecary on a white horse
  2. 18Ride by on his vocations,
  3. 19And the Devil thought of his old Friend
  4. 20Death in the Revelations.
  1. 21He saw a cottage with a double coach-house,
  2. 22A cottage of gentility;
  3. 23And the Devil did grin, for his darling sin
  4. 24Is pride that apes humility.
  1. 25He peep'd into a rich bookseller's shop,
  2. 26Quoth he! we are both of one college!
  3. 27For I sate myself, like a cormorant, once
  4. 28Hard by the tree of knowledge.
  1. 29Down the river did glide, with wind and tide,
  2. 30A pig with vast celerity;
  3. 31And the Devil look'd wise as he saw how the while,
  4. 32It cut its own throat. 'There!' quoth he with a smile,
  5. 33'Goes "England's commercial prosperity."'
  1. 34As he went through Cold-Bath Fields he saw
  2. 35A solitary cell;
  3. 36And the Devil was pleased, for it gave him a hint
  4. 37For improving his prisons in Hell.
  1. 38He saw a Turnkey in a trice
  2. 39Fetter a troublesome blade;
  3. 40'Nimbly,' quoth he, 'do the fingers move
  4. 41If a man be but used to his trade.'
  1. 42He saw the same Turnkey unfetter a man,
  2. 43With but little expedition,
  3. 44Which put him in mind of the long debate
  4. 45On the Slave-trade abolition.
  1. 46He saw an old acquaintance
  2. 47As he passed by a Methodist meeting;--
  3. 48She holds a consecrated key,
  4. 49And the devil nods her a greeting.
  1. 50She turned up her nose, and said,
  2. 51'Avaunt! my name's Religion,'
  3. 52And she looked to Mr. ----
  4. 53And leered like a love-sick pigeon.
  1. 54He saw a certain minister
  2. 55(A minister to his mind)
  3. 56Go up into a certain House,
  4. 57With a majority behind.
  1. 58The Devil quoted Genesis
  2. 59Like a very learnéd clerk,
  3. 60How 'Noah and his creeping things
  4. 61Went up into the Ark.'
  1. 62He took from the poor,
  2. 63And he gave to the rich,
  3. 64And he shook hands with a Scotchman,
  4. 65For he was not afraid of the ----
  1. 66General ---- burning face
  2. 67He saw with consternation,
  3. 68And back to hell his way did he take,
  4. 69For the Devil thought by a slight mistake
  5. 70It was general conflagration.