Chapter VI: Prologue

Peter Bells, one, two and three,
O'er the wide world wandering be.--
First, the antenatal Peter,
Wrapped in weeds of the same metre,
The so-long-predestined raiment
Clothed in which to walk his way meant
The second Peter; whose ambition
Is to link the proposition,
As the mean of two extremes--
(This was learned from Aldric's themes)
Shielding from the guilt of schism
The orthodoxal syllogism;
The First Peter--he who was
Like the shadow in the glass
Of the second, yet unripe,
His substantial antitype.--
Then came Peter Bell the Second,
Who henceforward must be reckoned
The body of a double soul,
And that portion of the whole
Without which the rest would seem
Ends of a disjointed dream.--
And the Third is he who has
O'er the grave been forced to pass
To the other side, which is,--
Go and try else,--just like this.
Peter Bell the First was Peter
Smugger, milder, softer, neater,
Like the soul before it is
Born from _that_ world into _this_.
The next Peter Bell was he,
Predevote, like you and me,
To good or evil as may come;
His was the severer doom,--
For he was an evil Cotter,
And a polygamic Potter.[81]
And the last is Peter Bell,
Damned since our first parents fell,
Damned eternally to Hell--
Surely he deserves it well!