will. It gives me great pleasure to be the means of bringing any sinner to the knowledge of Jesus. Could I be so happy as to be the instrument of inducing your majesty to become an humble follower of Jesus, I should triumph now and for ever. Whether you receive the gospel or not I shall be happy to hear that you always conduct yourself worthy of your former glory. Let not adversity force you to utter any abject complaints. Never stoop below the character of the hero. I am your faithful servant, CHARACTER AND EMPIRE OF SATAN. THE existence of an evil Being, having influence on the affairs of this world, is a truth that rests on the word of God. The errors of superstition on the one hand, and the scepticism of philosophy on the other, have depraved the accounts given of him in the Scriptures, and have both, served his purpose in calling off the attention of men from his true character. While the one exhibits him merely with horn and hoof, the terror of the nightly traveller; and the other either denies his existence, or represents him as a very harmless sort of Being, fit for the machinery of the comic drama; he is better enabled to deceive the world. Christians themselves may not sufficiently attend to what is written of him, and, therefore, be the more exposed to his influence. It shall, therefore, be the object of this Essay, to collect from the Scriptures the scattered hints of the character and empire of Satan, for the information and warning of all who fear God. SPIRITUALITY. SATAN IS A SPIRIT. This evil Being is represented to us in the Scriptures as a spirit. He is one of the fallen angels, and angels are spirits. Heb. i. 14. He is the Spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience.-Eph. ii. 2. This defends his character from the degrading representations of poetry; and the actions ascribed to him in the book of God, from the ridicule of wit and philosophy. Milton's devil is certainly much superior to the vulgar one of Tasso; but he is infinitely inferior to that of the Scrip tures. Though he is called a spirit, too much of his power, strength, and majesty result from size and other attributes of body. He is terrible as a giant, rather than as a spirit. Floating on a lake of brimstone, in length many a league, he has the same sort of sublimity with Mahomet's Borak whose head reached to the seventh heaven. When about to engage Ithuriel, he swells up to an enormous size touching the very stars, and unaccountably finds a spear equal to his arm, but I would rather see the martial tread of Cuthullin or the terrible mien of the son of Starno. The exhibition of Satan staggering from the stroke of Abdiel, and smarting from his airy wounds is more ridiculous than sublime. How much more terrible does Satan appear in the Scriptures, as the destroyer of mankind, by seducing them to his service, and continuing to reign over them as willing subjects? In "Paradise Lost," Satan's flight from hell is accomplished with time and immense toil: how much more sublime is the Scripture view of him, that represents him passing almost instantaneously, as a spirit, to all the different parts of the earth? MALIGNITY. One of the most remarkable features in the character of this Being is his malignity. From his enmity to man, he received his name Satan. He was the author of the ruin of the human race. He is the murderer of the whole family of Adam. To this day he holds the empire of death; every one as he dies may be said to fall by his hand, because he falls by the eating of the forbidden fruit. Therefore, it is written, that Jesus became a man, that by death he might destroy him who has the power (empire) of death, that is the devil. The cruelty that is in the heart of man was induced by becoming the children of Satan, through compliance with his temptation Ye are of your father the devil, says Jesus to the Pharisees, and the lusts of your father you will do: he was a murderer from the beginning. Yet the malignity of Satan is immensely beyond anything ever found in man. The most cruel tyrants of whom we read seem to have been influenced and excited by fear, envy, revenge, jealousy, and not to have been actuated solely by their delight in the misery of others. Some things in the history of Satan seem ascribable to nothing but pure malignity. What misery has been in the world since the fall! What murders, and wars, and cruelty! What poverty, and sickness, and suffering! The devil is the author of all by seducing our first parents from their allegiance to God. But this is nothing compared with that everlasting misery which is denounced as the punishment of all evil doers. What a malignant mind must be in the Being that planned the everlasting ruin of the whole race of Adam. Dives, even in hell, was anxious that his relatives should not come to that place of torment. It is usually said, indeed, that his motives were not affection, but dread of aggavated punishment to himself, as by his means they were strengthened in their infidelity. This, however, is not said in the Scriptures, and the narrative evidently ascribes his solicitude to affection for his brethren. I see nothing in the Scriptures to oblige me to suppose that the wicked become more depraved in hell than they were on earth. Man is now a child of the devil, yet I do not think that any of the human race, had they intercourse with the happy inhabitants of another planet, would wish to bring them into misery. The malignity of Satan is seen in the sufferings of Job. How anxious was he to obtain leave to afflict him! How full of hatred to man must he be to inflict so terrible a stroke on that happy family! What tyrant of the human race would not have pitied the anguish of that just man? Yet Satan is not to be moved, no measure nor duration of misery will satiate the malice of that malignant being. Without any abatement of rancour, he beholds his victim writhing under the most excruciating torments in his body, whilst his mind is oppressed with the sudden and unsuspected death of all his children. men. But his malignity is still more apparent in his cruelty to his own subjects. Hatred to God may increase his malice to the people of God, but he is cruel where there are no such additional excitements. This is seen in the diseases inflicted by the evil spirits under his government, when they obtained permission to take possession of How shocking is it to read the accounts given in the gospels of those possessed by these agents of Satan! Their greatest gratification appears to be human misery. Almost in all cases where they took possession of their isolated victim they brought disease. Read the piteous narrative of the possessed recorded, Mark ix. 17—22. What a horrid specimen of diabolical malignity! The demoniac in the country of the Gadarenes was always night and day in the mountains and in the tombs, crying and cutting himself with stones."-Mark v. 5. 66 There is nothing can put the malignity of infernal spirits in a more glaring point of view than the request of the legion that they might be permitted to enter into the herd of swine.-Mark v. 12. Whether their object was to inflict misery on the animals, or to injure their owners, or both, we see that the chief delight of the spirits of darkness is in doing mischief. It will afterwards appear that Satan has influence in the various modes of the religion of his servants of the human race; and it is evident how much human misery has been increased by false religion. Cruelty is the distinguishing feature of the gods and the worship of all idolators. The ancient Nemesis and the modern Juggernaut are princes under the same sovereign-the ruler of the darkness of this world. What insatiable malignity then must that being possess, whose chief delight is in cries, and groans, and blood! POWER. The power of Satan is such as will excite the wonder of all who attend to the display of it in the Scriptures, and ought to excite the caution of all who fear God. If |