heptagrammaton’s Reviews > Rats, Lice and History > Status Update

Man is too prone to look upon all nature with egocentric eyes. To the louse, we are the dreaded emissaries of death. He leads a relatively harmless life [...] then his host sickens [...] , and if [...] his stricken body is transferred to another host [whom he infects] he does so without guile, from the uncontrollable need for nourishment with death already in his own entrails.

... One can hear the devil's grandmother, adoringly watching him turn a squealing sinner on the spit, saying: "Oh, Beelzebub — you're nothing but a great big boy!"