name?  He would sooner clasp a devil in his own infernal shape and garb.  If it were not that Hypocrisy can disguise the name and nature of every evil under the semblance of some good, and give a bad name to every goodness, no man at all would put forth his hand to do evil or would lust after it.  Walk through the entire city of Destruction and ye will perceive her greatness in every quarter.  Go to the street of Pride and ask for an arrogant man or for a penny-worth of affectation mixed through pride:  ‘Woe is me,’ exclaims Hypocrisy, ‘there is no such thing here,’ no, nor for a devil, anything else in the whole street save proud demeanour.  Or walk into the street of Lucre and enquire for the miser’s house:  pshaw, there is no one of the kind therein; or for the dwelling of the murderer among the doctors, or for the abode of highwaymen amongst the drovers; thou wouldst sooner be thrown to prison for asking than that one should confess to his own name.  Yea, Hypocrisy crawls in between a man and his own heart, and so skilfully does she hide every wrong under the name and guise of some virtue that she has caused well nigh all to lose cognisance of their own selves.  Greed she calls thrift; in her tongue riotous living is innocent joy; pride is courtesy; the froward, a clever, courageous man; the drunkard, a boon companion; and adultery is a mere freak of youth.  On the other hand, if she and her scholars’ {110a} are to be believed, the godly is a hypocrite or a fool; the gentle, a coward; the abstemious, a churl, and so for every other quality.  Send her thither in all her adornment, and I warrant you she will deceive everyone; she will blinden the counsellors, the soldiers, and all the officers of church and state, and will draw them hither in hurrying multitudes with the varicolored mask upon their eyes.”  Whereupon he too sat down.

Then Beelzebub, the devil of thoughtlessness stood up, and in a harsh voice said:  “I am the great prince of heedlessness whose duty it is to prevent a man taking reflective heed of his state; I am chief of the incessant hell-flies who utterly amaze men, ever dinning in their ears concerning their possessions or their pleasures, and never willingly allowing them a moment’s leisure to think of their ways or of their end.  No one of you must dare enter the lists against me in feats serviceable to the realm of darkness.  For what is tobacco, but one of my meanest weapons to stupefy the brain?  What is Mammon’s kingdom but a part of my great dominion?  Yea, were I to loosen the bonds I have upon the subjects of Mammon and Pride, and even of Asmodai, Belphegor and Hypocrisy, no man would for an instant abide their domination.  Wherefore I will do the work and let no one of you ever utter a word.”