Devil stories. (Tales of the Infernal and the Supernatural)

The Devil is the greatest enigma that has ever con-fronted the human intelligence. So large a place has Satan taken in our imagination, and we might also say in our heart, that his expulsion therefrom, no matter what philosophy may teach us, must for ever remain an impossibility. As a character in imagi-native literature Lucifer has not his equal in heaven above or on the earth beneath. In contrast to the idea of Good, which is the more exalted in proportion to its freedom from anthropomor-phism, the idea of Evil owes to the presence of this element its chief value as a poetic theme. The discrowned archangel may have been inferior to St.
Michael in military tactics, but he cer-tainly is his superior in matters literary. The fair angels-all frankness and goodness-are beyond our comprehension, but the fallen angels, with all their faults and sufferings, are kin to us. There is a legend that the Devil has always had literary aspi-rations. The German theosophist Jacob Böhme relates that when Satan was asked to explain the cause of God's enmity to him and his consequent downfall, he replied: "I wanted to be an author." Whether or not the Devil has ever written anything over