e and Egypt. The Assyrian god
was often associated with the goat, which was supposed to possess the
qualities for which he was worshipped. The he-goat was also the sacred
beast of Donar or Thor, who was brought to Scandinavia by the
Phoenicians. (On the relation of satyrs to goats see also James G.
Frazer, _The Golden Bough_, vol. VIII, pp. 1 _sqq._) At the revels on
the Blocksberg Satan always appeared as a black buck.

_Le bon diable_, which is a favourite phrase in France, points to his
simplicity of mind rather than generosity of spirit. It generally
expresses the half-contemptuous pity with which the giants, these huge
beings with weak minds, were regarded.

The idea that Satan would gamble for a human soul is of mediaeval
origin and may have been taken by Baudelaire from Gerard de Nerval,
who in his mystery play _Le Prince des Sots_ (1830) has the devil play
at dice with an angel, with human souls as stakes. As a dice-player
Satan resembles Wuotan. Mr. H. G. Wells in _The Undying Fire_ (1919)
has Diabolus play chess with the Deity in Heaven.

The devil in this story falls back into speaking Hebrew when the days
of his ancient celestial glory are brought back to his mind. In Louis
Menard's _Le Diable au cafe_ the devil calls Hebrew a dead language,
and as a modern prefers to be called by the French equivalent of his
original Hebrew name. In the Middle Ages the devil's favourite
language was Latin. Marlowe's Mephistopheles also speaks this
language. Satan is known to be a linguist. "It is the Devil by his
several languages," said Ben Jonson.

According to popular belief the devil is a learned scholar and a
profound thinker. He has all science, philosophy, and theology at his
tongue's end.

The Shavian devil in contradistinction to the Baudelairian fiend does
bitterly complain that he is so little appreciated on earth. Walter
Scott's devil (in "Wandering Willie's Tale," 1824) also complains that
he has been "sair miscaa'd in the world."

The preacher to whom our author refers is the Jesuit Ravignan, who
declared that the disbelief in the devil was one of the most cunning
devices of the great enemy himself. (La plus grande force du diable,
c'est d'etre parvenu a se faire nier.) Baudelaire's disciple J. K.
Huysmans similarly expresses in his novel _La-Bas_ (1891) the view
that "the greatest power of Satan lies in the fact that he gets men to
deny him." (Cf. the present writer's essay "The Satanism of Huysmans"