9 I have Mental Joy, & Mental Health,
And Mental Friends, & Mental wealth;
I've a Wife I love, & that loves me;
I've all But Riches Bodily.
13 I am in God's presence night & day,
And he never turns his face away ;
The accuser of sins by my side doth stand,
And he holds my money bag in his hand.
17 For my worldly things God makes him pay,
And he'd pay for more if to him I would pray;
And so you may do the worst you can do;
Be assur'd, Mr Devil, I won't pray to you.
21 Then if for Riches I must not Pray,
God knows, I little of Prayers need say;
So, as a Church is known by its Steeple,
If I pray it must be for other People.
25 He says, if I do not worship him for a God,
I shall eat coarser food, & go worse shod;
So, as I don't value such things as these.
You must do, Mr Devil, just as God please.
9 Joy] joys R1 and all edd. 10 And Mental Friends] R1 and all
edd. except Swinb. omit 'And.' 11 Wife I love] Wife that I love R1
and all edd. except Swinb. 13-20 I am ... to you] Written later in
margin, and marked for insertion here. 14 And he] R1 and all edd.
except Swinb. omit 'And.' 15, 16 Cp. 'The Laocoon' (Prophetic
Books, 21) : ' Money, which is The Great Satan or Reason the Root of Good
& Evil In the Accusation of Sin.' 15 doth] does Swinb., EY, WBY.
16 money bag] money-bags EY, WBY. 19 And so you] And you
EY, WBY. 22 God . . . say] God knows it 's little prayers I need
say R1. Gil., WMR, EY. 25 if . . . him] if I worship not him R1, Gil.,
WMR ; if I don't worship him EY, WBY. 27 So] But R1, Gil.,
WMR, EY, WBY.
cxxxi
Do what you will this life's a fiction,
And is made up of contradiction.
MS. Book, p. 98, above stanza C 4 of ' Fayette' (MS. Book, xxxvi), which
appears upside down, written from the reversed end of the book. Printed
here for first time.
