{
 "id": "ambrose-bierce/the-transmigrations-of-a-soul",
 "title": "The Transmigrations of a Soul",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Ambrose Bierce",
 "poet_slug": "ambrose-bierce",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Black Beetles in Amber",
 "book_slug": "black-beetles-in-amber",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 15,
 "container": "Black Beetles in Amber",
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1892,
  "venue": "Black Beetles in Amber (1892)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/blackbeetlesinam00bier"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
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  "repo": "standardebooks/ambrose-bierce_poetry",
  "file": "black-beetles-in-amber.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
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   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12658",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12977",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/15599",
   "https://archive.org/details/collectedworksof04bierrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/collectedworksof05bierrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/collectedworksof08bierrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/shapesofclay00bier",
   "https://archive.org/details/blackbeetlesinam00bier",
   "https://archive.org/details/literarycalifor05mighgoog",
   "https://archive.org/details/cali07webb"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20",
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    "checked_against": "https://archive.org/details/blackbeetlesinam00bier",
    "date": "2026-08-20"
   }
  ]
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 71,
  "n_stanzas": 8,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 50,
  "max_indent": 3
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 "site_ready": true,
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 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "What! Pixley, must I hear you call the roll",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of all the vices that infest your soul?",
    "indent": 3
   },
   {
    "text": "Was’t not enough that lately you did bawl",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Your money-worship in the ears of all?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Still must you crack your brazen cheek to tell",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That though a miser you’re a sot as well?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Still must I hear how low your taste has sunk⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From getting money down to getting drunk?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Who worships money, damning all beside,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And shows his callous knees with pious pride,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Speaks with half-knowledge, for no man e’er scorns",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His own possessions, be they coins or corns.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "You’ve money, neighbor; had you gentle birth",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "You’d know, as now you never can, its worth.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "You’ve money; learning is beyond your scope,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Deaf to your envy, stubborn to your hope.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But if upon your undeserving head",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Science and letters had their glory shed;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "If in the cavern of your skull the light",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of knowledge shone where now eternal night",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Breeds the blind, poddy, vapor-fatted naughts",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of cerebration that you think are thoughts⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Black bats in cold and dismal corners hung",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That squeak and gibber when you move your tongue⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "You would not write, in Avarice’s defense,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A senseless eulogy on lack of sense,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor show your eagerness to sacrifice",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "All noble virtues to one loathsome vice.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "You’ve money; if you’d manners too you’d shame",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To boast your weakness or your baseness name.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Appraise the things you have, but measure not",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The things denied to your unhappy lot.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He values manners lighter than a cork",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Who combs his beard at table with a fork.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hare to seek sin and tortoise to forsake,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The laws of taste condemn you to the stake",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To expiate, where all the world may see,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The crime of growing old disgracefully.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Distinction, learning, birth and manners, too,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "All that distinguishes a man from you,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Pray damn at will: all shining virtues gain",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "An added luster from a rogue’s disdain.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But spare the young that proselyting sin,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A toper’s apotheosis of gin.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "If not our young, at least our pigs may claim",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Exemption from the spectacle of shame!",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Are you not he who lately out of shape",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Blew a brass trumpet to denounce the grape?⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Who led the brave teetotalers afield",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And slew your leader underneath your shield?⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Swore that no man should drink unless he flung",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Himself across your body at the bung?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Who vowed if you’d the power you would fine",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The Son of God for making water wine?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "All trails to odium you tread and boast,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Yourself enamored of the dirtiest most.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "One day to be a miser you aspire,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The next to wallow drunken in the mire;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The third, lo! you’re a meritorious liar!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Pray, in the catalogue of all your graces",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Have theft and cowardice no honored places?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Yield thee, great Satan⁠—here’s a rival name",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With all thy vices and but half thy shame!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Quick to the letter of the precept, quick",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To the example of the elder Nick;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With as great talent as was e’er applied",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To fool a teacher and to fog a guide;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With slack allegiance and boundless greed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To paunch the profit of a traitor deed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He aims to make thy glory all his own,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And crowd his master from the infernal throne!",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}