The Rime of the Ancient Mariner to row. The pilot's boy goes crazy and laughs, thinking the mariner is the devil, and cries, "The Devil knows how to row". As penance for shooting the albatross, the mariner, driven by guilt, is forced to wander the earth, telling his story over and over, and teaching a lesson to those he meets: After relaying the story, the mariner leaves, and the wedding guest returns home, and wakes the next morning "a sadder and a wiser man". The poem received mixed reviews from critics, and Coleridge was once told by the publisher that most of the book's sales were
The Book of Souls subject of particular praise, with PopMatters calling it a "masterpiece" and "every bit as spellbinding as 1984's 'Rime of the Ancient Mariner' [from 1984's "Powerslave"]". AllMusic described it as "a heavy metal suite, unlike anything in their catalogue". Although Blabbermouth.net and "NME" did not agree that it matches "Rime of the Ancient Mariner", the former stated that it is "worth every single minute as a cinematic-sounding encapsulation of the band's career", while the latter called it "the pièce-de-résistance". It also received a positive response from "Classic Rock", who deemed it a "stunning piece of work", while "Billboard" labelled it "a