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ow purposing to post a popper on the old man’s vain assurances, the Tempter turn-ed his face full upon Coccoludis the Wretched, that fear in him shud reign. But |
Coccolutis pulld out a religis tract and read thereof, and rebuk-ed him, saying, I will not fear, for that the prophet hath told unto me, Fear Not; and this tract persuadeth me some what also, with its diagrammes of securité.
But the Rude Awakener did borrow the tract, and setted fire upon’t. And he with an heinous finger did point across the way and shew unto Cocco there the clippt head of the brutal’d boastwain, with its own ashen visage and its glazen orbs agog. And the devil did say, Fay! No Fear? Yet see yon ghastic face transfixt in greed of delicious fear, he a-hogging the trough of dread. See upon that larcenous visage the fear purloind unto its own emergencied adornment. I had to cut him off for the sake of other customors, that there be feer to go around in time of need—which is alln the time, out here. What—wud we draw them into situashons of the calibur I contrive, setting them to purchase at the storehouse of ebony emotien, that alack they find it a’ready plunderd by this selfdealing ole glutter? No bit of that; I have ditcht him with a swat. FEAR FOR ALL, I cry. Unto each his mete, nor the lot of it to any one such as Sologlut here.
And the Hdhehvhihlh had some automaddic glory, and said, They say I care not; but I do.
And the one without name shake off his glory and opend a face in his torso, dead level with the face of Coccolutus (so long & high were the Unblunt Punchman). And the torsal face wink-ed an eye and said in sportsome tone, Wudst thou to see a bunche of souls? And that Boogre Man thrusten forth before Coccolutus am ampule of lucent souls apulse with their prismatical writhings & soundless screamings.
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And Coccolutus wheeld & reeld, ashrieking, Weww! N’er knew I that life’s closing curtin cud run so to rags. What goeth on in there? Referrd pain? Say; I can feel some of’t refer-red unto my frame, e’en through the crystal. Tell me, dear Destroyer, that this thou holdest is but some Fareastern carnivol geegaw, some dummystunner pulld off with smoke & lights, neither any actuel torcherd soulage. To thinq it Real demandeth a size-ier raft of thinqing than the shallow mindpoole can float!
And the Goat of Tempers he rockt the wild with laffter and said, Pain thou saist. In the unbounded cosmologum of grief, upon the breaking-wheel of life & states beyond, upon the infinit misery continuem that runneth from frosty shivers through plasmothermical tears, thy so-said Pain were but a twinge knewn to mortol sense. Pain wud be a candiemeat for these postemortalics; behold those faces. They here are in such fix that only a millien geniuses a millien years aponder might even posit its porameters. I am many thingues, but I am no damns gennius. (Dost not thou envy my delight in mockery of modesty? Surely all virtues are my trash.) I know only that in this vial is such concoxian that if ’twere smeard upon an acre, this whole vexatious creation shud cease to be. [So then too shud I, Shateen might to have said; but he dast not to confess it before his fearers.]
And the Forcer did some physics and opend the ampoule for a smell. And Coccolutus went wan, thinking, He will bid me also smell, and it will rocket my nostril and crisp my cake in its pan, and I shall come away from here an idyot. For what natienol god that I have spurn-ed will spring up merry and come a stone stopper over my disasteror out here? I am on mine own: man against unstoppabol monstor, in the monstor’s own milieu.
Yea, all this were that the Divvl said, and that what Cocco thank, standing there encounterd in the wilde. But now attend. When the world was clappt togethre, affairs were set aseething forth upon’t, with no certain course that even a Buff Rummie might forecipher. And whilst the Sad Sifter snifft his souls, the headshorn corpse that yet did drape the rock was totterd by devilwinds still arriving along the devil’s entrance vector. And ssschpahk! the slain bragaboo slided down upon that Auld Husq. And Coccolutus seen that Ah Ha was startld & jarrd like as any manperson that hath been startld & jarrd. And there plasht a dollopf of the ampule’s howling essences out upon the devol’s hooftoe. And the souls all escaip-ed into the forest.
And lo, the toe of Saitin was pooft and sent to pull some time in hell; and likewise was the ground b’neath the toe asht & netherd. And Saytine danst upon the path like as a barebuttman in bees; for the toe hath registerd in hell, and he feeleth it there burning on according to religis dogmas. And he cried with a voice beyond the laws of loudness, saying, NOW THIS; now this. And the voice shatterd the rock, and killd the trees, and brake the ears of Coccolutus, that he nevermore hear a damns thing. For when that a man connecteth with the devil, be cert that he will bring away some egregious memento.
And the Devil soakt into the soil and enterd a blasted tree thoo its roots. And the tree brought forth some dangerus figs, which turnt black and droppt off. And Coccolutus seen this all.
And it came to pass that Coccolutus did fear whilst he was in the valley, and did also fear eternal when that he was come again out. (For how now cud he stay?) Yea, in laying all his fear in the astonishing Devil, he hath settld to small regard for cows of Andromeda. And with hissing & slithring he took and dispers-ed them with a dead adder adangoling upon a stick. But ever rampant was his fear, for that the devil causeth him to fear.
Corollarial
Motherkin’s Filial Exhortation Invoking the Debacles of Coccolutus
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rt now thou grewn of age, headish child? Yon lieth a world for thee, sonpup, beyond that asshide-armor’d shittim wicker door that hath kept the werowulfs of night from |
our throats. (The slipping shadow-grey howlers & mottled siennas, they are the mad fact of the age. Through the potchamber chute those surreal razer’d gropers reacht and sliver’d thy sister Block ahunkering. O, into this house Grief move-ed, and took Block’s place as sistress thine & daughter mine.)
Yea, Through this barable to-&-fro—this hide-sheatht go-port—thou now wudst blow, for to cobble thine own shanty amongst the shanties, to scratch thy way upon thine own stoney patch, to spawn thine own vacuous larvae as I spawn-ed thee & that sistor Block that thou hadst. (Ever had we warnt the heedless damsel Blocke, saying, To it, to it, ere sunwane do it: make quick thy soil by the guarden light of day. Yet she the Nightdoer had but skeptified obbe noxius before our face, flinging taunts, and danst in to pump her wanton loads. Her they gat, thy sister that thou once hadst, for ever wud she hear us not. Grievous loss.)
Bead, O eyes of mine head, draw bead upon yon straplin full of thrust & punch, all stoke’t with wham and wow, who glideth about these premises making short, gathring up his goatskin of fortunary talismania & the truck of a baby’s life. He whittleth for him self a traipser’s staff and saith unto me, Well, I am going now; give me mine endowment, endowing me to go a-spending as I go. And he seeketh roundabouts for my bladder of monies which I have hid.
Sirrah! Shall not I endow thee, e’en as I have been endow’d with endowiment? Gold & molybdenum no, but with a gout of guiding discourse will I launch thee forth, that thou mayst find thy way in this tortured crucibol. ’Tis the best I own to pass off free, my foetus; haul it through the bogs of thy mind and grow it there in the spagnum. Attend, and be endowd!
As thou goest, trip light through herds abathe in the spark of pale Andromeda. Lapse not down in sottish abanden on the street, whither oft come catastrafee horns arousting and flesh-treading hoofs expunging. For tho thou like as Cocci Lutrus the Wretched elude a bloodful conculcatien there in the street, thine instant process then becometh a frighted flight into the wilde. And sure, there followeth according to the doctrines a wilderness date with the devol, who holdeth unto no nicety.
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(And say; e’en besides gorings & devilry, thou makest a sore & ungorgeous sight, pile’t there b’drunken in the dirt, giving glee to the neighbers agloating to my door, calling, Is not that thy prided son out in Malt, become living filth, and wildly derisable? And on that day, when the name of this house is Shame, what may I to do save call down assassins upon thine uncouthily dispose’d head? —’Twere not my choice, rather the implacabol tempers of tradishin; yet I see the sense in them.)
’Tis this the endowoment of self-preservy, a finer keepabol for thee than any spendable, O son-had-I. Fain wud I speak reams at thee of bloodculture cows, of devils and conquerd souls, and sewicide by pride—all, inasmuche as horrortalk maketh aces of a mother’s cautiens. One child all ready I lose-ed to the immodest grab of werowuffs; mine only other, I wud see him on his feet a season. Be scare’d & fleet, a darter, presupposing men’s design to see thee sprain’d. Be sweet, and enter not into terrific deals, lest thy self be grist neath a greater stone.
I do suppose that, dredging through the dives, thou mightst find some stringy wife to slapp the fuzz from thy cheeks and scold it from thine ears. And fretter’s grooves will array sovereign upon thy creamy brow; before them thy flaxen bangs will rout, and straggle in retreat to high & sparse & shallow rooting. A diffrent world ’twill be, in the day when I shall stand stoopt in the garden, canesmacking the chokeweed and dripping tears to Odin, and through the rotton gate thine embattld countenance will come a-visit. And I, so long since speaking, shall out in rookish voice: Is that thou which wast my son, the abandoner? Rich first with two chylds, then scuttld down to none, I through cadderax do see thy face groteskt, as in its just dessert thus fixt. For sure corrupted was thy file in nature, and thine image smeard, in the dizzy bizness of the leaving-day when that thou from me didst zoom.
So, then. Upon thy way thou truly zoomest, now, to contest the devil in destiny. What advising say I to thee? Hiding is good alway, for there is nought out there that a man can beat. Yea, e’en the very devil hath misfortunes; a man hath nought but. Tho that devle in his dealings stumbol, he bounceth up on buttox of galactic sapphire woven with dark light; whereas, a man that goeth down, he sploocheth on buddox made of clay and wove with straw. And amid the drizzol of adversidy, the man he cometh all apart. (And moreover, when drizzleth down upon him adversody? Why, ev’ry day. ’Tis every day that adverside drizzleth down; and every day that a man cometh apart.)
Tho, sure, none of this upon the sonchylde which electeth to keep him in the house of his mother—his mother, who, vigorated in the bond with her progeny, is given say over the adverse rules of nature, and demoteth them unto scofft propositiens. And there in her house may he abide & prospre, except that he hunker in the potchamber past dusk, when the werowulfs reach in.
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luminance
Ch 5
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the beast above