p. 46 | THE DEVIL by A. J. Hough

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Michigan · Mar 15, 1887

THE DEVIL.

By A. J. Hough

Men don't believe in the Devil now, as their fathers used to do; They've forced the door of the broadest creed to let his majesty through. There isn't a print from his cloven foot, or a fiery dart from his bow, To be found on earth or air to-day; for the world has voted so.

But who is it mixes the fatal draught that palsies heart and brain, And loads the bier of each passing year with ten hundred thousand slain? Who blights the bloom of the land to-day with the fiery breath of hell, If the Devil isn't, and never was? Won't somebody rise and tell?

Who dogs the steps of the toiling saint, and digs the pit for his feet? Who sows the tares in the field of time wherever God sows his wheat? The Devil is voted not to be, and of course the thing is true; But who is it doing the kind of work the Devil alone should do?

We are told he doesn't go about as a roaring lion now, But whom shall we hold responsible for the everlasting row To be heard in church, in home, and State, to earth's remotest bound, If the Devil by unanimous vote is nowhere to be found?

Won't somebody step to the front forthwith, and make their bow, and show How the frauds and crimes of a single day spring up? We want to know. The Devil was fairly voted out, and of course the Devil's gone; But simple people would like to know who carries his business on. —A. J. Hough.