Les Litanies De Satan [English translation]

[Words taken from Charles Baudelaire's poem, in the section "Révolte", and music of Beethoven]

O you, the most learned and handsome among angels,

a god betrayed by fate and bereft of praise,

O Satan, have mercy of my long suffering!

O prince of exile, whom men use to wrong

and, after being vanquished, rise ever stronger,

O Satan, have mercy of my long suffering!

You who know everything, great king of subterranean things,

intimate soother of human anguish,

O Satan, have mercy of my long suffering!

You who through love teach even the lepers

and the accursed outcasts the taste of Heavens,

O Satan, have mercy of my long suffering!

O you who bred from death, your old and strong lover,

the charming fool that expectation is!

O Satan, have mercy of my long suffering!

You who cast at the proscribed this quiet and lofty glance,

who damn a whole people around a scaffold

O Satan, have mercy of my long suffering!

You who know in which recesses of the covetous lands

the jealous God hid precious stones,

O Satan, have mercy of my long suffering!

You whose piercing eye knows the deep arsenals

where the burried people of metals sleep,

O Satan, have mercy of my long suffering!

You whose broad hand hides the chasms

from the sleepwalker wandering on the building edges,

O Satan, have mercy of my long suffering!

You who by magic soften the old bones

of the lingering drunk trampled by horses,

O Satan, have mercy of my long suffering!

You who, to comfort the frail suffering man

taught us how to mix salpetre and sulphur,

O Satan, have mercy of my long suffering!

You who stamp your mark, o subtle accomplice,

on the forehead of the ruthless and vile Cresus,

O Satan, have mercy of my long suffering!

You who put in the heart and eyes of the girls

the cult of the wound and the love of the rags,

O Satan, have mercy of my long suffering!

Staff of the exiled, lamp of the inventors,

confessor of the hanged men and conspirators,

O Satan, have mercy of my long suffering!

Adoptive father of those who were exiled

from earthly paradise by God's wrath,

PRAYER

Glory and praise to you, Satan, in the heights

of Heavens, where you used to rule, and in the depths

of Hell where, vanquished, you dream in silence!

See that someday my soul may rest by your side

under the Tree of Science, at the time when its branches

will be spread on your forehead like a new Temple!

• Artist:Theatres des Vampires
• Album:Bloody Lunatic Asylum