"The Cult Of Venus Aversa" lyrics - CRADLE OF FILTH

I am She
Lilith
Mistress of the dark
Of Sheba
First offender and succour to demons
Whose sweet seductions and wicked rites
Lead all those too enslaved by the flesh
To trespass against God's holy law
And tonight I come for you

Midnight strikes, the candles sputter
Muttering their recking spells
I snuff their tongues, my heart a-flutter
These words I speak are gates to Hell
These words I speak are gates to Hell

Casus belli
In hoc signo vinces
Veritas vos liberabit
Casus belli
In hoc signo vinces
In aeternum, amen
Casus belli
In hoc signo vinces
Veritas vos liberabit
Casus belli
In hoc signo vinces
In aeternum, amen

The scent of death is rent
In this ornamental verse
In ventures down the centuries
Tormenting me with secrets so anathema
And now the fires grate
I must relate, to end this curse
I'll break through spires to escape my fate
Am I too late or just perverse?

Midnight strikes, the candles sputter
Muttering their recking spells
I snuff their tongues, my heart a-flutter
These words I speak are gates to Hell

So the blight begins
Near the woodland of a frightened village
Where the rites of unimaginable sin
And the howling on the wind
Chills the blood for fear of spillage

Where nightfall used to be
Blessed with best tranquility
It's no caressed by misadventure

Templars from the crusades
Have birthed a church, more masquerade
In which they worship mass dementia

They came from dust and flame
By the Red Sea on dead shores
Fleeing claims of blasphemy and bestiality
Devils fed them back to us

Knights of holy wars, inviting hordes of grim infidelities
In the grip of cryptic lands and desert sands
They found just cause

And midst their entourage
Under stars
They bought relics and parts of saints
And evil left to clerics charge

With Muslim plunder they built their sect
To the composite Baphomet
An androgynous sphinx, open, erect
Universal in its closet display

Spawn of Lilith and Samael
First offender and the snake
In thrall like pawns beneath its spell
The templars grew to astute surrender
Sabbatical, fanatical
They adorned its monstrous bur
Whit a kings ransom of Easter jewels
The embodiment of beast and lust

Many moons improved the boon
Of immutable beautiful darkness ever-afters

Then one eve when the ancient trees
Outside, drew back, unnerved
The pleas form those impatient teased
Something from the black beyond of nowhere

A stunning woman, summoned
Comming scimitar-curved
Statuesque, but living flesh
Draping nakedness about their pagan saviours

She came Lilith, a perfect myth
The scarlet whore
Skinned in magnificence
In her defense
She only slew a few of them

Born of a sacrifice, a virgin's price
For the merging with a Goddess
She prowled the world again
Enslaving man
With the surging of her bodice

Midnight strikes, the candles sputter
Muttering their recking spells
I snuff their tongues, my heart a-flutter
These words I speak are gates to Hell

Casus belli
In hoc signo vinces
Veritas vos liberabit
Casus belli
In hoc signo vinces
In aeternum, amen
Casus belli
In hoc signo vinces
Veritas vos liberabit
Casus belli
In hoc signo vinces
In aeternum, amen