perfect and sublime Grand Man by which the whole heaven is figured.
This Grand Man of hell, this One representing all, was the Devil who tempted our Lord. This is the Devil or Satan always meant in the Word of God, which in its spiritual sense describes everything from a divine standpoint. Devils are innumerable. The Devil, as a single evil spirit supreme over all others, does not exist. He is a shadow, a symbol, a representative figure projected in front of us from innumerable similar figures invisible behind us. This view furnishes a solution to one of the strangest mysteries rising from the literal sense of the Scriptures, viz., the doctrine of a personal Devil, "archangel ruined," so vast and powerful as to contend with the Supreme Being for the throne of the universe.
In what occupations are devils, spiritual forms of evil and falsity, likely to engage? The will ever strives to go forth into act. The delight of life is to do and to be what one loves. The delight of heaven is to obey the Lord and to do good to the neighbor. The delight of hell is the gratification of an evil selfhood and supremacy over the neighbor. Harmony is the spirit of heaven. Discord is the spirit of hell. The word Satan in its
