John Milton - 3 books to know The Devil

I am inclined ~also to the more charitable opinion of Satan too, because the escape of the Israelites was really a triumph over himself; for the war was certainly his, or at least he was auxiliary to Pharaoh; it was a victory over hell arid Egypt together; and he would never have suffered the disgrace, if he had known it beforehand; that is to say, though he could not have prevented the escape of Israel, or the dividing the water, yet he might have warned the Egyptians, and cautioned them not to venture in after them.

But we shall see a great many weak steps taken by the Devil in the affair of this very people, and their forty years’ wandering in the wilderness; and, though he was in some things successful, and wheedled them into many foolish and miserable murmurings and wranglings against God, and mutinies against poor Moses, yet the Devil was oftentimes balked and dis appointed; and it is for this reason that I choose to finish the first part of his history with the particular relation of his behavior among the Jews, because also we do not find any extraordinary things happening anywhere else in the world for above one thousand five hundred years, no variety, no revolutions; all the rest of mankind lay still under his yoke, quietly submitted to his government, did just as he bade them, worshipped every idol he set up. and, in a word, he had no difficulty with any body but the Jews; and, for this reason, I say, this part of his story will be the more useful and instructing.

To return therefore to Moses, and his dividing the Red Sea; that the people went, over or through it, that we have the sacred history for; but how the Devil behaved, that you must come to me for, or I know not where you will find a true account of it, at least not in print.

1. It was in the night they marched through; whether the Devil saw it in the dark or no, that is not my business.

But when he had day-light for it, and viewed the next day’s work, I make no question but all hell felt the surprise, the prey being thus snatched out of their hands unexpectedly. It is true the Egyptians’ host was sent to him in their room; but that was not what he aimed at; for he was sure enough of them his own way, and if it was not just at that time, yet he knew what and who they were; but as he had devoured the whole Israelitish host in his imagination, to the tune of at least a million and an half of souls; men, women, and children; it was, no doubt, a great disappointment to the Devil to miss of his prey, and to see them all triumphing on the other side in safety.

It is true, Satan’s annals do not mention this defeat; for historians are generally backward to register their own misfortunes; but as we have an account of the fact from other hands, so as we cannot question the truth of it; the nature of the thing will tell us it was a disappointment to the Devil, and a very great one too.

I cannot but observe here, that I think this part of the Devil’s story very entertaining, because of the great variety of incidents which appear in every part of it; sometimes he is like an hunted fox, curvetting and counter-running to avoid his being pursued and found out, while at the same time he is carrying on his secret designs to draw the people he pretends to manage, into some snare or other, to their hurt; at another time, though the comparison is a little too low for his dignity, like a monkey that has done mischief, and which, making his own escape, sits and chatters at a distance, as if he had triumphed in what he had done; so Satan, when he had drawn them in to worship a calf, to offer strange fire, to set up a schism, and the like; and so to bring the Divine vengeance upon themselves; leaving them in their distress, kept at a dis tance, as if he looked on with satisfaction to see them burnt, swallowed up, swept away, and the like; as the several stories relate.

His indefatigable vigilance is, on the other hand, an useful caveat, as Avell as an improving view to us; no sooner is he routed and exposed, defeated and disappointed in one enterprize, but he begins another, and, like a cunning gladiator, warily defends himself, and boldly attacks his enemy at the same time. Thus we see him up and down, conquering and conquered, through this whole part of his story, till, at last, he receives a total defeat; of which you shall hear in its place. In the mean time, let us take up his story again at the Red Sea, where he received a great blow, instead 12 of which he expected a complete victory; for, doubtless, the Devil and the king of Egypt too, thought of nothing but conquest at Pihahiroth.

However, though the triumph of the Israelites over the Egyptians must needs be a great mortification to the Devil, and exasperated him very much, yet the consequence was only this; namely, that Satan, like an enemy who is balked and defeated, but not overcome, redoubles his rage, and reinforces his army, and what the Egyptians could not do for him, he resolves to do for himself. In order then to take his opportunity for what mischief might offer, being defeated, and provoked, I say, at the slur that was put upon him. he resolves to follow them into the wilderness, and many a vile prank he played them there; as first, he straitens them for water, and makes them murmur against God, and against Moses, within a very few days, nay, hours, of their great deliverance of all.

Nor was this all, but in less than one year more we find them (at his instigation too) setting up a golden calf, arid making all the people dance about it at Mount Sinai; even when God himself had but just before appeared to them in the terrors of a burning fire upon the top of the mountain; and what was the pretence? Truly, nothing but that they had lost Moses, who used to be their guide, and he had hid himself in the mount, and had not been seen in forty days; so that they could not tell what was become of him. This put them all into confusion. A poor pretence indeed, to turn them all back to idolatry! But the watchful Devil took the hint, pushed the advantage, and insinuated, that they should never see Moses again; that he was certainly devoured by venturing too near the flashes of fire in the mount, and presuming upon the liberty he had taken before. In a word, that God had destroyed Moses, or he was starved to death for want of food, having been forty days and forty nights absent.

All these were, it is true, in themselves most foolish suggestions, considering Moses was admitted to the vision of God, and that God had been pleased to appear to him in the most intimate manner; that, as they might depend God would not destroy his faithful servant, so they might have concluded he was ahle to support his being without food as long as he thought fit. But to a people so easy to believe anything, what could be too gross for the Devil to persuade them to?

A people who could dance round a calf, and call it their God, might do anything; that could say to one another, that this was the Great Jehovah, that brought them out of the land of Egypt; and that within so few days after God’s miraculous appearance to them, and for them; I say, such a people were really fitted to be imposed upon, nothing could be too gross for them.

This was indeed his first considerable experiment upon them as a people, or as a body; and the truth is, his affairs required it; for Satan, who had been a successful Devil in most of his attempts upon mankind, could hardly doubt of success in anything after he had carried his point at Mount Sinai. To bring them to idolatry in the very face of their deliverer, and just after the deliverance! It was more astonishing in the main than even their passing the Red Sea. In a word, the Devil’s whole history doth not furnish us with a story equally surprising.

And how was poor Aaron bewildered in it too! He that was Moses’ partner in all the great things that Moses did in Pharaoh’s sight, and that was appointed to be his assistant and oracle, or orator rather, upon all public occasions; that he, above all the rest, should come into this absurd and ridiculous proposal, he that was singled out for the sacred priesthood, for him to defile his holy hands with a polluted abominable sacrifice, and with making the idol for them too (for it is plain that he made it,) how monstrous it was!