The History of the Devil, As Well Ancient as Modern: In Two Parts

by Daniel Defoe

This Story however may solve a great many of those Things which pass for Apparitions in the World, and which are laid to the Devil’s Charge, tho’ he really may know nothing of the Matter; and this would bring me to defend Satan in many Things, wherein he may truly be said to suffer wrongfully; and if I thought it would oblige him, I might say something to his Advantage this Way; however, I’ll venture a Word or two for an injur’d Devil, take it as you will.

First, it is certain, that as this Invisibility of the Devil is very much to our Prejudice, so the Doctrine of his Visibility is a great Prejudice to him, as we make Use of it.

By his Invisibility he is certainly vested with infinite Advantages against us; while he can be present with us, and we know nothing of the Matter, he informs himself of all our Measures, and arms himself in the best and most suitable manner to injure and assault us, as he can counteract all our secret concerted Designs, disappoint all our Schemes, and except when Heaven apparently concerns it self to over-rule him, can defeat all our Enterprizes, break all our Measures, and do us Mischief in almost every Part of our Life, and all this, because we are not privy to all his Motions, as he is to ours.

But now for his Visibility and his real Appearance in the World, and particularly among his Disciples and Emissaries, such as Witches and Wizards, Demonaists, and the like: Here, I think Satan has a great deal of Loss, suffers manifest Injury, and has great Injustice done him; and, that therefore I ought to clear this Matter up a little, if it be possible, to do Justice to Satan, and set Matters right in the World about him, according to that useful old Maxim of setting the Saddle upon the right Horse, or giving the Devil his due.

First, as I have said, we are not to believe every idle Head, who pretends even to converse Face to Face with the Devil, and who tells us, they have thus seen him, and been acquainted with him every Day: Many of these Pretenders are manifest Cheats; and, however, they would have the Honour of a private Interest in him, and boast how they have him at their Beck, can call him this Way, and send him that, as they please, raise him and lay him when and how, and as often as they find for their Purpose; I say, whatever Boasts they make of this Kind, they really have nothing of Truth in them.

Now the Injuries and Injustice done to the Devil, in these Cases, are manifest; namely, that they entitle the Devil to all the Mischief they are pleased to do in the World; and if they commit a Murther or a Robbery, fire a House, or do any Act of Violence in the World, they presently are said to do it by the Agency of the Devil, and the Devil helps them; so Satan bears the Reproach, and they have all the Guilt; this is, (1.) a grand Cheat upon the World, and (2.) a notorious Slander upon the Devil; and it would be a public Benefit to Mankind, to have such would-be-Devils as these turn’d inside out, that we might know when the Devil was really at work among us, and when not; what Mischiefs were of his doing, and which were not; and that these Fellows might not slip their Necks out of the Halter, by continually laying the Blame of their Wickedness upon the Devil.

Not that the Devil is not very willing to have his Hand in any Mischief, or in all the Mischief that is done in the World; but there are some low priz’d Rogueries that are too little for him, beneath the Dignity of his Operation, and which ’tis really a Scandal to the Devil to charge upon him. I remember the Devil had such a Cheat put upon him in East-Smithfield once, where a Person pretended to converse with the Devil Face to Face, and that in open Day too, and to cause him to tell Fortunes, foretel Good and Evil, &c. discover stollen Goods, tell where they were who stole them, and how to find them again, nay, and even to find out the Thieves; but Satan was really slandered in the Case, the Fellow had no more to do with the Devil than other People, and perhaps not so much neither: This was one of those they call’d Cunning-Men, or at least he endeavour’d to pass for such a one, but ’twas all a Cheat.

Besides, what had the Devil to do to detect Thieves, and restore stollen Goods? Thieving and Robbing, Trick and Cheat, are part of the Craft of his Agency, and of the Employments which it is his Business to encourage; they greatly mistake him, who think he will assist any Body in suppressing and detecting such laudable Arts and such diligent Servants.

I won’t say, but the Devil, to draw these People we call Cunning-Men, into a Snare, and to push on his farther Designs, may encourage them privately, and in a manner that they themselves know nothing of, to make use of his Name, and abuse the World about him, till at last they may really believe they do deal with the Devil, when indeed ’tis only he deals with them, and they know nothing of the Matter.

In other Cases he may encourage them in these little Frauds and Cheats, and give them leave, as above, to make use of his Name to bring them afterwards, and by Degrees to have a real Acquaintance with him; so bringing the Jest of their Trade into Earnest, till at length prompting them to commit some great Villany, he secures them to be his own, by their very Fear of his leaving them to be exposed to the World; thus he puts a Jonathan Wild upon them, and makes them be the very Wretches they only pretended to be before: So old Parsons of Clithroe, as Fame tells, was twenty five Years a Cunning-man, and twenty two Years a Witch; that is to say, for five and twenty Years, he was only pretending to deal with the Devil, when Satan and he had no manner of Acquaintance, and he only put his Leger-de-main upon the People in the Devil’s Name, without his leave; but at length the Devil’s Patience being tir’d quite out, he told the old Counterfeit, that in short, he had been his stalking Horse long enough, and that now, if he thought fit to enter himself, and take a Commission, well and good; and he should have a Lease to carry on his Trade for so many Years more, to his Heart’s content; but if not, he would expose his Knavery to the World, for that he should take away his Peoples Trade no longer; but that he (Satan) would set up another in his Room, that should make a meer Fool of him, and carry away all his Customers.