In the Preface to “A Vision of Judgement” (1821), Robert Southey wrote: “Men of diseased hearts and depraved imaginations, who, forming a system of opinions to suit their own unhappy course of conduct, have rebelled against the holiest ordinances of human society, and hating that revealed religion which, with all their efforts and bravadoes, they are unable entirely to disbelieve, labour to make others as miserable as themselves, by infecting them with a moral virus that eats into the soul! The school which they have set up may properly be called the Satanic School, for though their productions breathe the spirit of Belial in their lascivious parts, and the spirit of Moloch in those loathsome images of atrocities and horrors which they delight to represent, they are more especially characterized by a Satanic spirit of pride and audacious impiety, which still betrays the wretched feeling of hopelessness wherewith it is allied.”
This is pretty tough stuff and the object of the wrath is two poems one written by Southey, and one written by Lord Byron, over the state of the soul of King George III. That is pretty esoteric stuff and unless you are into the history or literature and poetry meaningless. But if you are into history as a devolvement and debasement of all that is good and of all that God intended and that the ultimate end of history is Christ, this is fascinating stuff. What Southey way back in 1821/22 and Byron were arguing about was the concept of making the weird and abnormal heroic and inspiring. The concept of the anti-hero was in the offing but more than that was this idea that people who know that they are strange and in rebellion with their creator instead of repenting and asking forgiveness, rebel further, and try to get others to rebel with them. If they can’t get them to follow they will try and make everyone miserable.
This is a great insult but it is long and a bit hard to follow. Just go ahead and read Romans 1
