Literature: from the Mysterious Stranger, Mark Twain, published 1916

At last I made bold to ask him to tell us who we was.

‘An angel,’ he said, quite simply, and set another bird free and clapped his hands and made it fly away.

A kind of awe fell upon us when we heard him say that, and we were afraid again; but he said we need not be troubled, there was no occasion for us to be afraid of an angel, and he liked us, anyway. He went on chatting as simply and unaffectedly as ever… Then Seppi asked him what his own name was, and he said, tranquilly, ‘Satan’…

It caught us suddenly, that name did, and our work dropped out of our hands and broke to pieces… Satan laughed, and asked what was the matter. I said, ‘Nothing, only it seemed a strange name for an angel.’ He asked why.

‘Because it’s – it’s – well, it’s his name, you know.’
‘Yes, - he is my uncle.’
He said it placidly, but it took our breath for a moment and made our hearts beat… ‘Don’t’ you remember? – he was an angel himself, once.’

‘Yes – it’s true,’ said Seppi; ‘I didn’t think of that.’
‘Before the Fall he was blameless.’
‘Yes,’ said Nikolaus, ‘he was without sin.’
‘It is a good family – ours,’ said Satan; ‘there is not a better. He is the only member of it that has ever sinned.’