John Beard

The Autobiography of Satan John Beard

Publisher Marketing: As this book is intended not so much for scholars as the general pubhc, I have not attempted more than a series of readable sketches. The same consideration has led me to adopt the aatobiographical form, which, with the supposition of an intelligent companion, gives me some of the advantages of a conversational style. Only in the large portion of the work devoted to the Scriptures have I, without departing from a popular manner, aimed at a certain degree of completeness. To handle adequately all the grave topics of this comprehensive theme would require a library instead of a volume. Having aimed at nothing less than to deal a blow at Traditionalism, Sacerdotalism and Satanism, which reciprocally evoke and support each other, and which, in a brood of superstitions, have inflicted on our race many of the direst evils under which it has suffered, I have simply pursued such a method as seemed to me most likely to conduce to my object. I may have missed my mark, but I shall pass the rest of my days in deeper satisfaction for having shot the arrow. And this observation leads me to say that personal considerations have exercised an influence in determining me to compose the book. My childhood and early youth were haunted by cruel phantasms which had their source in the gross superstition I now