To the Reader Folly, error, sin, and penny-pinching Preoccupy our minds and belabor our bodies And we feed our amiable remorse Like beggars nourishing their vermin. Our sins are stubborn, our repentance weak -- We demand generous payment for our confessions And we return gaily to the muddy path, Believing a few abject tears will wash away all of our stains. Satan Trismegistus patiently rocks our enchanted spirit To sleep on the pillow of evil, And the rich metal of our will Is vaporized completely by this learned alchemist. The Devil pulls the strings that move us! Repugnant things attract us -- Each day we descend one step closer to Hell, Moving without horror through stinking shadows. Like a poor debauchee kissing and gnawing The martyred breast of an ancient whore, We steal a furtive pleasure along the way, And we press it hard, like an old orange. Tightly packed, swarming, like a million tapeworms, A legion of Demons booze it up in our brains, And when we breathe, Death, an invisible river, Descends into our lungs, with a dull groan. If rape, poison, the dagger, and arson Have not yet embroidered their pretty patterns On the banal canvas of our pitiful destinies, It is only because our soul is -- alas! -- not bold enough. But among the jackals, panthers, and bitch-hounds, The monkeys, scorpions, vultures, and serpents, The yelping, howling, growling, groveling monsters In the infamous menagerie of our vices, There is one who is uglier, nastier, more foul! Although he makes no grand gestures, no great noise, He would willingly reduce the earth to ruins And swallow the world in a yawn; It is Ennui! His eye brimming with an involuntary teardrop, He dreams of scaffolds while smoking a hookah. You know him, reader, this delicate monster, -- Hypocrite reader, -- my like, -- my brother!

— Charles Baudelaire

#evil #hypocrisy #sin #death