In the following narrative, Lucifer is not Satan, King of Evil, who in the beginning led the rebels from Heaven, establishing the underworld.
In the following narrative, Lucifer is not Satan, King of Evil, who in the beginning led the rebels from Heaven, establishing the underworld.
Lucifer is here taken as a character appearing much later, the first singing creature weary of established ways in music, moved with the lust of wandering. He finds the open road between the stars too lonely. He wanders to the kingdom of Satan, there to sing a song that so moves demons and angels that he is, at its climax, momentary emperor of Hell and Heaven, and the flame kindled of the tears of the demons devastates the golden streets.
Therefore it is best for the established order of things that this wanderer shall be cursed with eternal silence and death. But since then there has been music in every temptation, in every demon voice.
Along with a set of verses calledThe Heroes of Time, and anotherThe Tree of Laughing Bells, I exchangedThe Last Song of Luciferfor a night’s lodging in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Ohio, as narrated inA Handy Guide for Beggars.
The fourteenth chapter of Isaiah contains these words on Lucifer:
“Thy pomp is brought down to the grave, and the noise of thy viols: the worm is spread under thee and the worms cover thee.
“How art thou fallen from Heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning. How art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations.
“For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into Heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God....
“All the kings of the nations, even all of them, lie in glory, every one in his own house.
“But thou art cast out of thy grave like an abominable branch, and as the raiment of those that are slain, thrust through with a sword, that go down to the stones of the pit; as a carcass trodden under feet.
“Thou shalt not be joined to them in burial, because thou hast destroyed thy land.”