Blake seeks to provide the Golden String which can lead us through the labyrinth of our experience or his own poetry.

Thursday, August 18, 2016

BLAKE'S SUN

"The Sun. 'I have conversed with the Spiritual Sun  ”I saw him on Primrose-hill. He said, "Do you take me for the Greek Apollo?" "No," I said, "that" [and Blake pointed to the sky] "that is the Greek Apollo. He is Satan."'

William Blake (Symons) Part II Records from contemporary sources (I.) Extracts from the Diary, Letters, and Reminiscences of Henry Crabb Robinson

Wikipedia Commons
Milton's Ode Written on the 
Morning of Christ's Nativity
Object 4

The Overthrow of Apollo  and the Pagan Gods

Wikipedia Commons
Illustrations to the Book of Job
Butts set, Plate 14

When the Morning Stars Sang Together

Wikipedia Commons
Illustrations to Milton's L'Allegro 
Object 3

The Sun at His Eastern Gate

Wikimedia Commons
Illustrations to Milton's Il Penseroso
Object 6

The Youthful Poet's Dream

Wikipedia Commons
Il Penseroso
Object  10

The Sun in His Wrath

Wikipedia Commons Milton
Copy D, Plate 47

Encounter with Los as Spiritual Sun

In Blake's system there were two suns: the physical or natural sun identified with Urizen, and the spiritual sun identified with Los. The sun god of the Greeks, Apollo, was synonymous with the physical sun.
 

In his Illustrations to Milton's Ode Written on the Eve of Christ's Nativity, Blake pictured Apollo as one of the ancient Gods deposed by the advent of Christ. With the birth of Christ, man's understanding of the light of the world is transferred from the material object which Apollo transported across the celestial realm each day, to the greater light which illumines man from within.

Vision of Last Judgment, (E 565)
"Error is
Created Truth is Eternal Error or Creation will be Burned Up &
then & not till then Truth or Eternity will appear It is Burnt up
the Moment Men cease to behold it I assert for My self that I do
not behold the Outward Creation & that to me it is hindrance &
not Action it is as the Dirt upon my feet No part of Me. What it
will be Questiond When the Sun rises  do  you  not  see  a  round 
Disk of fire somewhat like a Guinea O no no I see an Innumerable
company of the Heavenly host crying Holy Holy Holy is the Lord
God Almighty I question not my Corporeal or Vegetative Eye any
more than I would Question a Window concerning a Sight I look
thro it & not with it."

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