BLAKE & STRINGS 3

British Museum

Illustrations to Young's Night Thoughts

The underlying motif of Blake's poetry is dividing which connotes a falling away from truth, then followed by uniting which assimilates a higher truth. The bow together with its arrows was the vehicle for separating Albion into his Zoas. For Albion to become complete, conscious, and self aware, the process must be reversed. To accomplish this the bowstrings are once again set in motion. All that can be annihilated is annihilated. The contraries Good & Evil are married and the children of Jerusalem are saved from slavery. The Four Zoas resume their proper functions.

Annotations to Swedenborg, (E 604)
"Good & Evil are here both Good   & the two contraries Married"

Descriptive Catalogue, (E 544)

"All that is not action is 
not worth reading.  Tell me the What; I do not want you to
tell me the Why, and the How; I can find that out myself, as well
as you can, and I will not be fooled by you into opinions, that
you please to impose, to disbelieve what you think improbable or
impossible.  His opinions, who does not see spiritual agency, is
not worth any man's reading; he who rejects a fact because it is
improbable, must reject all History and retain doubts only."

Milton, Plate (E 142)

"And all beneath the Nations innumerable of Ulro
Appeard, the Seven Kingdoms of Canaan & Five Baalim
Of Philistea. into Twelve divided, calld after the Names      
Of Israel: as they are in Eden. Mountain. River & Plain
City & sandy Desart intermingled beyond mortal ken

But turning toward Ololon in terrible majesty Milton
Replied. Obey thou the Words of the Inspired Man
All that can be annihilated must be annihilated

That the Children of Jerusalem may be saved from slavery"

Milton, Plate 1, (E 95)
    "And did those feet in ancient time,
     Walk upon Englands mountains green:
     And was the holy Lamb of God,
     On Englands pleasant pastures seen!

     And did the Countenance Divine,             
     Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
     And was Jerusalem builded here,
     Among these dark Satanic Mills?

     Bring me my Bow of burning gold:
     Bring me my Arrows of desire:                     
     Bring me my Spear: O clouds unfold!
     Bring me my Chariot of fire!"

Albion's bow

Jerusalem, Plate 95, (E 255)
"The Breath Divine went forth over the morning hills Albion rose 
In anger: the wrath of God breaking bright flaming on all sides around
His awful limbs: into the Heavens he walked clothed in flames
Loud thundring, with broad flashes of flaming lightning & pillars
Of fire, speaking the Words of Eternity in Human Forms, in direful
Revolutions of Action & Passion, thro the Four Elements on all sides  
Surrounding his awful Members. Thou seest the Sun in heavy clouds
Struggling to rise above the Mountains. in his burning hand
He takes his Bow, then chooses out his arrows of flaming gold
Murmuring the Bowstring breathes with ardor! clouds roll around the
Horns of the wide Bow, loud sounding winds sport on the mountain brows
Compelling Urizen to his Furrow; & Tharmas to his Sheepfold;
And Luvah to his Loom: Urthona he beheld mighty labouring at
His Anvil, in the Great Spectre Los unwearied labouring & weeping
Therefore the Sons of Eden praise Urthonas Spectre in songs
Because he kept the Divine Vision in time of trouble."        

Fourfold Bow

 Jerusalem, Plate 98, (E 257)
"Then each an Arrow flaming from his Quiver fitted carefully
They drew fourfold the unreprovable String, bending thro the wide Heavens
The horned Bow Fourfold, loud sounding flew the flaming Arrow fourfold

Murmuring the Bow-string breathes with ardor. Clouds roll round the horns
Of the wide Bow, loud sounding Winds sport on the Mountains brows: 
The Druid Spectre was Annihilate loud thundring rejoicing terrific vanishing

Fourfold Annihilation & at the clangor of the Arrows of Intellect"

BLAKE & STRINGS 2

 Wikipedia Commons

Book of Urizen

Plate 24

To Blake the symbol of the Bow and Arrows had multiple applications. He saw that the image well represented his own experience. The poem which he composed while walking to see friends in Lavant while he was living at Felpham, made use explicitly of both bowstring and arrows. He represented his mind by the bows and his thoughts as the arrows. Apparently he had been struggling to determine how to balance claims that various friends and family members placed on him. After reviewing a long list of complaints he received the insight that his individual experience fit into the pattern which applies to every individual. The mind is capable of discerning four different ways of responding the data which it receives. Every experience has the potential for becoming visionary if one is not satisfied with single vision, duality, or ordinary interpretation there is another option; he may invite the imagination to allow him entry into a visionary state.

Blake's bows and arrows

 

Letters, To Butts, (E 720)

     "With happiness stretchd across the hills
     In a cloud that dewy sweetness distills
     With a blue sky spread over with wings
     And a mild sun that mounts & sings
     With trees & fields full of Fairy elves 5
     And little devils who fight for themselves
     Remembring the Verses that Hayley sung

     When my heart knockd against the root of my tongue
     With Angels planted in Hawthorn bowers
     And God himself in the passing hours
     With Silver Angels across my way
     And Golden Demons that none can stay
     With my Father hovering upon the wind
     And my Brother Robert just behind
     And my Brother John the evil one
     In a black cloud making his mone
     Tho dead they appear upon my path
     Notwithstanding my terrible wrath
     They beg they intreat they drop their tears
     Filld full of hopes filld full of fears
     With a thousand Angels upon the Wind
     Pouring disconsolate from behind
     To drive them off & before my way
     A frowning Thistle implores my stay
     What to others a trifle appears
     Fills me full of smiles or tears
     For double the vision my Eyes do see
     And a double vision is always with me
     With my inward Eye 'tis an old Man grey
     With my outward a Thistle across my way
     "If thou goest back the thistle said
     Thou art to endless woe betrayd
     For here does Theotormon lower
     And here is Enitharmons bower
     And Los the terrible thus hath sworn
     Because thou backward dost return
     Poverty Envy old age & fear
     Shall bring thy Wife upon a bier
     And Butts shall give what Fuseli gave
     A dark black Rock & a gloomy Cave."

     I struck the Thistle with my foot
     And broke him up from his delving root
     "Must the duties of life each other cross"
     "Must every joy be dung & dross"
     "Must my dear Butts feel cold neglect"
     "Because I give Hayley his due respect'
     "Must Flaxman look upon me as wild"
     "And all my friends be with doubts beguild'
     "Must my Wife live in my Sisters bane"
     "Or my sister survive on my Loves pain'
     "The curses of Los the terrible shade"
     "And his dismal terrors make me afraid"

     So I spoke & struck in my wrath
     The old man weltering upon my path
     Then Los appeard in all his power
     In the Sun he appeard descending before
     My face in fierce flames in my double sight
     Twas outward a Sun: inward Los in his might

     "My hands are labourd day & night"
     "And Ease comes never in my sight"
     "My Wife has no indulgence given"
     "Except what comes to her from heaven"
     "We eat little we drink less"
     "This Earth breeds not our happiness"
     "Another Sun feeds our lifes streams"
     "We are not warmed with thy beams"
     "Thou measurest not the Time to me"
     "Nor yet the Space that I do see"
     "My Mind is not with thy light arrayd"
     "Thy terrors shall not make me afraid"

     When I had my Defiance given
     The Sun stood trembling in heaven
     The Moon that glowd remote below
     Became leprous & white as snow
     And every Soul of men on the Earth
     Felt affliction & sorrow & sickness & dearth
     Los flamd in my path & the Sun was hot
     With the bows of my Mind & the Arrows of Thought
     My bowstring fierce with Ardour breathes
     My arrows glow in their golden sheaves
     My brothers & father march before
     The heavens drop with human gore

     Now I a fourfold vision see
     And a fourfold vision is given to me
     Tis fourfold in my supreme delight
     And three fold in soft Beulahs night
     And twofold Always.  May God us keep
     From Single vision & Newtons sleep"

BLAKE & STRINGS

---

Yale Center for British Art

Jerusalem

Plate 30

The symbolism of the Bow String is not obvious. It has both a positive and a negative function. The bow is an instrument which is capable of setting in motion the arrow which is designed to produce results. In the thought of our poet the release of the arrow from the string of the bow sets in motion consequential activity. In the Four Zoas the release of the arrow from the bow starts the process through which the natural world is created.

Sung at the Feast of Los & Enitharmon

Four Zoas, Night I, Page 15, E 309
"The Horse is of more value than the Man. The Tyger fierce
Laughs at the Human form. the Lion mocks & thirsts for blood
They cry O Spider spread thy web! Enlarge thy bones & fill'd
With marrow. sinews & flesh Exalt thyself attain a voice

Call to thy dark armd hosts, for all the sons of Men muster together       
To desolate their cities! Man shall be no more! Awake O Hosts
The bow string sang upon the hills! Luvah & Vala ride
Triumphant in the bloody sky. & the Human form is no more   

The listning Stars heard, & the first beam of the morning started back
He cried out to his Father, depart! depart! but sudden Siez'd   
And clad in steel. & his Horse proudly neighd; he smelt the battle 
Afar off, Rushing back, reddning with rage the Mighty Father  

Siezd his bright Sheephook studded with gems & gold, he Swung it round
His head shrill sounding in the sky, down rushd the Sun with noise
Of war, The Mountains fled away they sought a place beneath      
Vala remaind in desarts of dark solitude. nor Sun nor Moon

By night nor day to comfort her, she labourd in thick smoke  
Tharmas endurd not, he fled howling. then a barren waste sunk down
Conglobing in the dark confusion, Mean time Los was born
And Thou O Enitharmon! Hark I hear the hammers of Los"   

Los and Enitharmon have the potential for providing experience in the natural world which will keep the mind open to the eternal world.

Jerusalem, Plate 97, (E 256) 

"Urthona Northward in thick storms a Bow of Iron terrible thundering.

And the Bow is a Male & Female & the Quiver of the Arrows of Love,
Are the Children of this Bow: a Bow of Mercy & Loving-kindness: laying
Open the hidden Heart in Wars of mutual Benevolence Wars of Love"

The bow in the hands of Vala is a Black Bow and it delivers arrows which initiate division.

Vala's black bow
 
Four Zoas, Night V, Page 59, (E 340)
"Where is Sweet Vala gloomy prophet where the lovely form
That drew the body of Man from heaven into this dark Abyss
Shew thy soul Vala shew thy bow & quiver of secret fires

Draw thy bow Vala from the depths of hell thy black bow draw  
And twang the bow string to our howlings let thine arrows black
Sing in the Sky as once they sang upon the hills of Light
When dark Urthona wept in torment of the secret pain

He wept & he divided & he laid his gloomy head
Down on the Rock of Eternity on darkness of the deep             
Torn by black storms & ceaseless torrents of consuming fire
Within his breast his fiery sons chaind down & filld with cursings"

With the arrival of Orc the Black Bow releases the violence of war and Vala suffers the consequences.

Four Zoas, Night V, Page 92, (E 364)
"Stop we the rising of the glorious King. spur spur your clouds 

Of death O northern drum awake O hand of iron sound
The northern drum. Now give the charge! bravely obscurd!
With darts of wintry hail. Again the black bow draw
Again the Elemental Strings to your right breasts draw
And let the thundring drum speed on the arrows black  

The arrows flew from cloudy bow all day. till blood
From east to west flowd like the human veins in rivers
Of life upon the plains of death & valleys of despair

Now sound the clarions of Victory now strip the slain
clothe yourselves in golden arms brothers of war      
They sound the clarions strong they chain the howling captives
they give the Oath of blood They cast the lots into the helmet, 
They vote the death of Luvah & they naild him to the tree
They piercd him with a spear & laid him in a sepulcher
To die a death of Six thousand years bound round with desolation 
The sun was black & the moon rolld a useless globe thro heaven

Then left the Sons of Urizen the plow & harrow the loom
The hammer & the Chisel & the rule & compasses
They forgd the sword the chariot of war the battle ax
The trumpet fitted to the battle & the flute of summer 
And all the arts of life they changd into the arts of death
The hour glass contemnd because its simple workmanship
Was as the workmanship of the plowman & the water wheel
That raises water into Cisterns broken & burnd in fire
Because its workmanship was like the workmanship of the Shepherd 
And in their stead intricate wheels invented Wheel without wheel
To perplex youth in their outgoings & to bind to labours
Of day & night the myriads of Eternity. that they might file
And polish brass & iron hour after hour laborious workmanship
Kept ignorant of the use that they might spend the days of wisdom
In sorrowful drudgery to obtain a scanty pittance of bread
In ignorance to view a small portion & think that All
And call it Demonstration blind to all the simple rules of life

Now now the Battle rages round thy tender limbs O Vala" 

PRIMER FOREWARD

Wikipedia Commons

Songs of Innocence and of Experience

Garden of Love

Late 18th Century Europe existed in a state of rapid transition from medievalism to modernity. The old arrangement of society, a divinely ordained king, a land owning aristocracy, and a marriage of Church and State came increasingly under the attacks of political, economic, and religious progressives. The American Revolution pointed toward the outcome of the struggle. In Europe the decisive event came with the French Revolution and its aftermath.

William Blake lived through those stirring times. His work has great significance as political commentary. Now two centuries later its spiritual dimension has assumed even greater moment. Blake participated passionately in the social and political debates of the day, although few contemporaries heard his voice. It is his place in the spiritual dialogue that exercises the greatest fascination and will probably endure when the other dimensions of his thought have passed into the dust of time. Blake radically redefined the Christian faith and offered to his own and later generations a religious perspective that takes fully into account the corruptions of the past and the psychological sophistication of the future.

It was during Blake's age that religious faith in Europe began to lose its grip upon the minds of men. His generation saw the final breakdown of the Medieval Synthesis and the triumphant emergence of the Age of Reason. He participated in a decisive battle of the eternal war between conservative religionists and liberal rationalists. Though without the bloodshed of earlier days, it was a conflict in which quarter was neither given nor expected. The battle pitted the community of faith, which in the 18th Century suffered an eclipse, against the rationalists, critical men of great brilliance. But none of the rationalists surpassed the brilliance of William Blake, a critical man of faith; their contribution to modern thought had its day; we are still far from catching up with his.

In the battle between faith and reason Blake occupied a unique middle ground. On one hand he constantly attacked an oppressive politico-religious establishment; on the other he just as steadfastly defended a spiritual orientation against the rationalists. This meant for Blake a lifetime engagement on two fronts.

This book describes and explores the various dimensions of Blake's vision of Christianity. One overriding consideration determined that vision: Blake saw freedom as the primary and ultimate value. The attitudes he expressed toward all institutions, his evaluation of them, the comments he made about them with his poetry and pictures, all these things were determined by the institution's relationship to that supreme value of freedom. He believed from the depths of his being that coercion in any form is the primary evil. It outweighs and in fact negates any benefit that an established religion may afford. Blake believed that regardless of his professed faith, the leader who uses coercion thereby shows himself to be a follower of the God of this World, the Tempter with whom Jesus dealt in the wilderness.

As a religious thinker Blake customarily receives the designation of radical Protestant. The seeds of his protest go back far beyond Luther. In his day a more common term was dissenter. Blake protested against and dissented from the authority of the orthodox Christian tradition. We can best understand Blake as a thinker, as a Christian, and as a man in terms of this dissent from orthodoxy. His intellectual life in many ways summarized the history of Christian dissent. His art evoked and drew upon the earlier occurrences of dissent through the centuries.

Blake defined God in terms of vision. Every man has his own vision of God, and no two are exactly alike. Blake spent much of his time and energy describing the superstitious images of God embraced by men in his day as in our own. With his usual extravagant language he was capable of saying something like 'their God is a devil'. He's referring to their vision, their image of God. Think for a moment about the vision of God of the Inquisitors, of for that matter of Bin Laden. Their God gloried in blood, but not my God, Blake's or yours!

Jesus was an obvious dissenter from the orthodox tradition into which he was born. He blithely ignored many of the requirements of respectable Judaism. He repeatedly violated the Sabbath. He felt perfectly free to initiate conversation with unfamiliar women, a gigantic taboo; in fact he spent hours with disreputable characters of both sexes. He ate without washing his hands. All these acts seriously violated the laws of his religious tradition. In 'The Marriage of Heaven and Hell' Blake claimed that Jesus broke all of the ten commandments and "was all virtue, and acted from impulse, not from rules" (See Chapter Five ).

Going beyond mere dissent Jesus attacked the established religious leaders. He called them whited sepulchers, poked fun at them, and encouraged all sorts of insubordination among their followers. Worst of all he set himself up as an alternative authority. In all these ways he directly challenged the religious leaders and provoked them to bring about his execution as a revolutionist.

Jesus perceived death as the ultimate authority or power of the world. On behalf of his ideals and with spiritual power he challenged death, and according to the Christian faith he defeated it; he conquered death. In the words of Paul he "abolished death". Blake understood this in a more existential way than do most Christians. One of his primary themes, running from the very beginning of his poetry until the last day of his life, was the redefinition of death in accordance with the Christian gospel. 

___________________

Ephesians 2
[8] For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
[9] Not of works, lest any man should boast.
[10] For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

2nd Timothy 1

[7] For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.
[8] Be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me his prisoner: but be thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel according to the power of God;
[9] Who hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began,
[10] But is now made manifest by the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who hath abolished death, and hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel:

Vision of Last Judgment, (E 565) 

" Angels are happier than Men <&
Devils> because they are not always Prying after Good & Evil in
One Another & eating the Tree of Knowledge for Satans
Gratification
     Thinking as I do that the Creator of this World is a very
Cruel Being & being a Worshipper of Christ I cannot help saying
the Son O how unlike the Father   First God Almighty comes with a
Thump on the Head Then Jesus Christ comes with a balm to heal it" 

Jerusalem, Plate 62, (E 213)

"Jesus replied. I am the Resurrection & the Life.

I Die & pass the limits of possibility, as it appears

To individual perception. Luvah must be Created

And Vala; for I cannot leave them in the gnawing Grave.

But will prepare a way for my banished-ones to return

Come now with me into the villages. walk thro all the cities.

Tho thou art taken to prison & judgment, starved in the streets

I will command the cloud to give thee food & the hard rock

To flow with milk & wine, tho thou seest me not a season

Even a long season & a hard journey & a howling wilderness!

Tho Valas cloud hide thee & Luvahs fires follow thee!

Only believe & trust in me, Lo. I am always with thee!" 

.

SCHOOLMASTER

British Museum

Illustrations to Young's Night Thoughts

 

If you are the reflective sort of person, you can look at the life you are living from multiple perspectives. One lens through which I see my life is that of symbols. Since Blake was a master of creating symbols, manipulating symbols and revealing their meaning, I lean on him to teach me the whys, hows and whens of discovering and applying meanings enclosed in the input which bombards me.

Blake's Urizen was his symbol for the reasoning mind. The implications of Urizen as a symbol  spread in many directions. A fairly simple manifestation of Urizen was a the 'schoolmaster.' You probably remember that on the first day of his schooling, little William observed the schoolmaster 'birching' a child, got up and left the classroom, and never returned. Blake immediately reacted to the enforced discipline which the schoolmaster imposed. So the schoolmaster was useful as the aspect of Urizen which tried to control the behavior of others.

Four Zoas, Night IX,(E 389) 
"The Eternal Man sat on the Rocks & cried with awful voice

O Prince of Light [Urizen] where art thou   I behold thee not as once
In those Eternal fields in clouds of morning stepping forth 
With harps & songs where bright Ahania sang before thy face
And all thy sons & daughters gatherd round my ample table
See you not all this wracking furious confusion
Come forth from slumbers of thy cold abstraction come forth
Arise to Eternal births shake off thy cold repose 
Schoolmaster of souls great opposer of change arise
That the Eternal worlds may see thy face in peace & joy
That thou dread form of Certainty maist sit in town & village
While little children play around thy feet in gentle awe
Fearing thy frown loving thy smile O Urizen Prince of light" 

Marriage of Heaven an Hell, Plate 5, (E 48)

"and wilt thou take the ape 

For thy councellor? or the dog, for a schoolmaster to thy children?"  

 

Notebook, (E 518) 

"You say their Pictures well Painted be 

And yet they are Blockheads you all agree 

Thank God I never was sent to school 

To be Flogd into following the Style of a Fool "

Songs of Innocence and of Experience, Song 53, (E 31) 
"The School Boy               

I love to rise in a summer morn,
When the birds sing on every tree;
The distant huntsman winds his horn,
And the sky-lark sings with me.
O! what sweet company. 

But to go to school in a summer morn,
O! it drives all joy away;
Under a cruel eye outworn,
The little ones spend the day,
In sighing and dismay.

Ah! then at times I drooping sit,
And spend many an anxious hour.
Nor in my book can I take delight,
Nor sit in learnings bower,
Worn thro' with the dreary shower. 
 
How can the bird that is born for joy,
Sit in a cage and sing.
How can a child when fears annoy,
But droop his tender wing,
And forget his youthful spring.

O! father & mother, if buds are nip'd,
And blossoms blown away,
And if the tender plants are strip'd
Of their joy in the springing day,
By sorrow and cares dismay, 

How shall the summer arise in joy.
Or the summer fruits appear,
Or how shall we gather what griefs destroy
Or bless the mellowing year,
When the blasts of winter appear. "

Songs of Innocence and of Experience, Song 54, (E 31)
"The Voice of the Ancient Bard.     

Youth of delight come hither:
And see the opening morn,
Image of truth new born.
Doubt is fled & clouds of reason.
Dark disputes & artful teazing.
Folly is an endless maze,
Tangled roots perplex her ways,

How many have fallen there!
They stumble all night over bones of the dead,
And feel they know not what but care 
And wish to lead others, when they should be led."

Jerusalem, Plate 15, (E 159)
"I turn my eyes to the Schools & Universities of Europe
And there behold the Loom of Locke whose Woof rages dire  
Washd by the Water-wheels of Newton. black the cloth
In heavy wreathes folds over every Nation; cruel Works
Of many Wheels I View, wheel without wheel, with cogs tyrannic
Moving by compulsion each other: not as those in Eden: which
Wheel within Wheel in freedom revolve in harmony & peace." 

Four Zoas, Night II, Page 28, (E 318)
"And many said We see no Visions in the darksom air
Measure the course of that sulphur orb that lights the darksom day  
Set stations on this breeding Earth & let us buy & sell
Others arose & schools Erected forming Instruments               
To measure out the course of heaven. Stern Urizen beheld
In woe his brethren & his Sons in darkning woe lamenting
Upon the winds in clouds involvd Uttering his voice in thunders
Commanding all the work with care & power & severity"

Miscellaneous Prose, Blake's Autograph, (E 698)
"I am apt to believe that what is done
without meaning is very different from that which a Man Does with
his Thought & Mind & ought not to be Calld by the Same Name."

---

Galatians 3

[24] Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith.
[25] But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster.

 

STRETCH OUT YOUR HAND

Illustrations to Young's Night Thoughts 

Poetical Sketches, (E 441) 

 THE COUCH OF DEATH.

"The veiled Evening walked solitary down the western hills, and
Silence reposed in the valley; the birds of day were heard in
their nests, rustling in brakes and thickets; and the owl and bat
flew round the darkening trees: all is silent when Nature takes
her repose.--In former times, on such [a]n evening, when the cold
clay breathed with life, and our ancestors, who now sleep in
their graves, walked on the stedfast globe, the remains of a
family of the tribes of Earth, a mother and a sister were
gathered to the sick bed of a youth: Sorrow linked them together,
leaning on one another's necks alternately--like lilies, dropping
tears in each other's bosom, they stood by the bed like reeds
bending over a lake, when the evening drops trickle down.  His
voice was low as the whisperings of the woods when the wind is
asleep, and the visions of Heaven unfold their visitation. 
"Parting is hard, and death is terrible; I seem to walk through a
deep valley, far from the light of day, alone and comfortless!
The damps of death fall thick upon me! Horrors stare me in the
face! I look behind, there is no returning; Death follows after
me; I walk in regions of Death, where no tree is; without a
lantern to direct my steps, without a staff to support me."--Thus
he laments through the still evening, till the curtains of
darkness were drawn! Like the sound of a broken pipe, the aged
woman raised her voice.  "O my son, my son, I know but little of
the path thou goest! But lo, there is a God, who made the world;
stretch out thy hand to Him." The youth replied, like a voice
heard from a sepulchre, "My hand is feeble, how should I stretch
it out? My ways are sinful, how should I raise mine eyes? My
voice hath used deceit, how should I call on Him who is Truth? My
breath is loathsome, how should he not be offended? If I lay my
face in the dust, the grave opens its mouth for me; if I lift up
my head, sin covers me as a cloak! O my dear friends, pray ye for
me! Stretch forth your hands, that my helper may come! Through
the void space I walk between the sinful world and eternity!
Beneath me burns eternal fire! O for a hand to pluck me forth!"
As the voice of an omen heard in the silent valley, when the few
inhabitants cling trembling together; as the voice of the Angel
of Death, when the thin beams of the moon give a faint light,
such was this young man's voice to his friends! Like the bubbling
waters of the brook in the dead of night, the aged woman raised
her cry, and said, "O Voice, that dwellest in my breast, can I
not cry, and lift my eyes to heaven? Thinking of this, my spirit
is turned within me into confusion! O my child, my child! is thy
breath infected? So is mine.  As the deer, wounded by the brooks
of water, so the arrows of sin stick in my flesh; the poison hath
entered into my marrow."--Like rolling waves, upon a desert
shore, sighs succeeded sighs; they covered their faces, and wept!
The youth lay silent--his mother's arm was
under his head; he was like a cloud tossed by the winds, till the
sun shine, and the drops of rain glisten, the yellow harvest
breathes, and the thankful eyes of the villagers are turned up in
smiles.  The traveller that hath taken shelter under an oak, eyes
the distant country with joy!  Such smiles were seen upon the
face of the youth! a visionary hand wiped away his tears, and a
ray of light beamed around his head!  All was still.  The moon
hung not out her lamp, and the stars faintly glimmered in the
summer sky; the breath of night slept among the leaves of the
forest; the bosom of the lofty hill drank in the silent dew,
while on his majestic brow the voice of Angels is heard, and
stringed sounds ride upon the wings of night.  The sorrowful pair
lift up their heads, hovering Angels are around them, voices of
comfort are heard over the Couch of Death, and the youth breathes
out his soul with joy into eternity."  

Blake was but a youth himself when he wrote the prose poem named The Couch of Death which was included in the little book of his poems, Poetical Sketches, published by his generous friends.

In The Couch of Death the youthful Blake seems to have left behind the stage of innocence, and stood on the brink of experience. He knew that what lay before him was perilous and unknown. He wrote of a boy who was dying. But was he dying to the past so that future could unfold? Did Blake already have the intimation that his visionary world could not be contained in time? The youth walked through the 'void space' between 'the sinful world and eternity.' But he 'stretched fourth his hands' and his helper came. The most salient statement is the last - 'the youth breathes out his soul with joy into eternity.' The choice was made; the life of his soul would dwell not in the ordinary world of time but in eternity where his imagination could soar.  

 

Hymn - Guide me, O thou great Jehovah, 

.

MYTH OF PERSEPHONE

First posted as Lyca in August 2016.

Blake's pursuit of Greek mythology becomes apparent as we try to understand The Little Girl Lost and The Little Girl Found. Kathleen Raine pointed the way to understanding the two poems from Songs of Experience as Blake's application of the Eleusinian Mysteries to his own experience of spiritual/psychological development. From Thomas Taylors' Dissertations on the Eleusinian and Bacchic Mysteries, Blake was acquainted with the ancient sources which revealed some of the mysteries which formed the structure of much of the spiritual and ethical foundations of ancient cultures for thousands of years.

The following account traces Lyca's experience as fitting into the type of Persephone as Blake adapted it to his own poetic imagination.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Kathleen Raine focused her study of Blake on tracing Blake's sources using all the clues that he left in his writings and visual imagery. She read what he was known to have read going back through the centuries. One of the outcomes of her pursuit was the realization that Greek Mythology had an enormous influence on the creation of Blake's myth of fall and redemption. Blake seamlessly wove the threads of Biblical influences with the thought revealed in the totality of Greek myth. Raine's two volume masterpiece, Blake and Tradition, plunges into the depths of esoteric and mythopoeic writings to reveal Blake's intent in the choice of his symbols. She later condensed some of her insight in Blake and Antiquity. Raine was my guide in becoming better acquainted with the following poems.

If we take a careful look at Blake's The Little Girl Lost and The Little Girl Found from Songs of Experience, we may recognize that we are seeing a preview of characters in his later poems. After becoming acquainted with Thomas Taylor and saturating himself with the work Taylor was doing in translating Greek Mythology and philosophy into English, Blake incorporated characters and scenarios from Greek myths into his lexicon of imagery. The character Lyca in The Little Girl Lost and The Little Girl Found, by being assigned the role of Persephone, is a precursor for Vala. The depth of meaning in the tale of Persephone which formed the structure of the Eleusinian Mysteries, is seen running through Blake's recurring tale of fall, wandering, and return.

Persephone was among the loveliest of immortals before she plucked the flower, (as did Oothoon), that introduced her to another level of consciousness. In her tale the young woman, who represents the Soul, is abducted by Pluto, called by Raine 'material nature'. She was carried away from the world of the immortals and down into the earth.

Blake's Little Girl is not innocent to the attraction of the 'wild birds song.' In the first image we see not the child we read about, but a couple - a male and female - embracing. The call to materiality has been heard. The division between body and soul, which characterizes Ulro and Generation, has already occurred. The stage is set for the fall into our material world which is dualistic or 'sexual.'

Lyca accepts the invitation to enter the state of sleep thereby inviting the 'beasts of prey' to join her. She views the kingly lion, who Raine tells us represents the lion in the Zodiac, Pluto, king of the underworld and ruler of souls entering the afterlife. This is the traditional sleep of death when the body lies in the grave.

Blake's imagery bifurcates here representing, on the one hand, the experience of death in the material world and, on the other, exit from the eternal world to enter the world of time and space. In Lyca's sleep she is brought to a cavern where she later is joined by her parents. There is no return to Eternity in this tale. But there is no threat or fear in Lyca's cave from the wild animals with whom she plays.

Persephone represented the fertility of the earth among other things. Her disappearance underground interfered with the agricultural output. The Gods came up with a compromise in which she would send half of her time on the earth and half below the surface. Thus the cyclical rotation between the time when the fields were fallow and resting, and the time of production and harvest. Blake incorporated the fluctuation between the repose of Beulah and the activity of Eden into his system. We see here as well the symbiosis of body and soul, each in love with the other, and relinquishing itself for the other's life.

The implication in these poems is that the Soul may retain the ability to discern the Eternal in the time/space continuum. The mother of Persephone, Cerus (identified as intellect), engaged in a search similar to that undertaken by Lyca's mother which culminated in their being reunited at Eleusis. Blake's poems have the soul and intellect reunite in the unconscious.

The task of achieving a reunion with 'her maker' is expected in the future when the desert once again is a garden. In a future time she:

Songs of Experience, Song 34, (E 20) 
"Shall arise and seek 
For her maker meek: 
And the desart wild 
Become a garden mild."
 
But now she has a different task; she must pass through a world in which she lives in a body and knows woe as well as joy:
 
Jerusalem, Plate 4, (E 146)
"Chap: 1
Of the Sleep of Ulro! and of the passage through
Eternal Death! and of the awaking to Eternal Life."

Songs of Experience, SONGS 34, 35, 36, (E 20-21) 
"The Little Girl Lost        

In futurity
I prophetic see,
That the earth from sleep,
(Grave the sentence deep)

Shall arise and seek
For her maker meek:
And the desart wild
Become a garden mild.
___________________

In the southern clime,
Where the summers prime,
Never fades away;
Lovely Lyca lay.

Seven summers old
Lovely Lyca told,
She had wanderd long, 
Hearing wild birds song.

Sweet sleep come to me
Underneath this tree;
Do father, mother weep.--
Where can Lyca sleep.

Lost in desart wild
Is your little child.
How can Lyca sleep,
If her mother weep.

If her heart does ake, 
Then let Lyca wake;
If my mother sleep,
Lyca shall not weep.

Frowning frowning night,
O'er this desart bright,
Let thy moon arise,
While I close my eyes.

Sleeping Lyca lay;
While the beasts of prey,
Come from caverns deep, 
View'd the maid asleep

The kingly lion stood
And the virgin view'd,
Then he gambold round
O'er the hallowd ground;

SONGS 35
Leopards, tygers play,
Round her as she lay;
While the lion old,
Bow'd his mane of gold.

And her bosom lick,
And upon her neck,
From his eyes of flame,
Ruby tears there came;

While the lioness,
Loos'd her slender dress,
And naked they convey'd
To caves the sleeping maid.

The Little Girl Found

All the night in woe,
Lyca's parents go:
Over vallies deep,
While the desarts weep.

Tired and woe-begone, 
Hoarse with making moan:
Arm in arm seven days,
They trac'd the desart ways.

Seven nights they sleep,
Among shadows deep:
And dream they see their child
Starv'd in desart wild.

Pale thro' pathless ways
The fancied image strays,

SONGS 36 
Famish'd, weeping, weak
With hollow piteous shriek

Rising from unrest,
The trembling woman prest,
With feet of weary woe;
She could no further go. 

In his arms he bore,
Her arm'd with sorrow sore;
Till before their way,
A couching lion lay.

Turning back was vain, 
Soon his heavy mane,
Bore them to the ground;
Then he stalk'd around,

Smelling to his prey.
But their fears allay,
When he licks their hands;
And silent by them stands.

They look upon his eyes
Fill'd with deep surprise:
And wondering behold,
A spirit arm'd in gold. 

On his head a crown
On his shoulders down,
Flow'd his golden hair.
Gone was all their care. 

Follow me he said,
Weep not for the maid;
In my palace deep,
Lyca lies asleep.

Then they followed, 
Where the vision led:
And saw their sleeping child,
Among tygers wild.

To this day they dwell
In a lonely dell
Nor fear the wolvish howl,
Nor the lions growl." 

British Museum

Songs of Experience
Song 34, Copy B 
The Little Girl Lost 

British Museum

Songs of Experience
Song 35, Copy B 
The Little Girl Found 

British Museum

Songs of Experience
Song 36, Copy B 
The Little Girl Found 

 

COSMIC CONSCIOUSNESS

Jerusalem
Plate 95

A book published in 1901 by Richard Murice Bucke is titled Cosmic Consciousness. It is an exploration of a "higher form of consciousness than that possessed by the ordinary man." The bulk of the book is devoted to describing the life and work of individuals who achieved cosmic consciousness. Bucke includes William Blake among such men.

Burke refers to three levels of consciousness through which man passes as he progresses through development: simple, self and cosmic. This section begins on page 75:

"The passage from self to cosmic consciousness, considered from the point of view of the intellect, seems to be a phenomenon strictly parallel to the passage from simple to self consciousness.

As in the latter, so in the former, there are two chief elements: 

a. Added consciousness; 

b. Added faculty.

a. When an organism which possesses simple consciousness only, attains to self consciousness, it becomes aware for the first time that it is a separate creature, or self existing in a world which it is apart from it. That is, the oncoming of the new faculty instructs it without any new experience or process of learning.

b. It, at the same time, acquires enormously increased powers of accumulating knowledge and of initiating action.

So when a person who was self conscious only, enters into cosmic consciousness -

a. He knows without learning (from the mere fact of illumination) certain things, as, for instance: (1) that the universe is not a dead machine but a living presence; (2) that in its essence and tendency it is infinitely good; (3) that individual existence is continuous beyond what is called death. At the same time:

b. He takes on enormously greater capacity both for learning and initiating."

Page 79

..."briefly and explicitly, the marks of the Cosmic Sense:

a. The subjective light
b. The moral elevation
c. The intellectual illumination.
d. The sense of immortality.
e. The loss of fear of death.
f. The loss of sense of sin.
g. The suddenness, instantaneousness, of the awakening.
h. The previous character of the man - intellectual, moral and physical.
i. The age of the illumination.
j. The added charm of the personality so that men and women are always (?) strongly attracted to the person.
k. The transfiguration of the subject of the change as seen by others when the cosmic sense if actually present.

---

These are quotes from Blake's work which Bucke gives in support of his inclusion of Blake among those who had achieved cosmic consciousness.

Vision of Las Judgment, (E 555)
"This world of Imagination is the World of
Eternity it is the Divine bosom into which we shall all go after
the death of the Vegetated body   This World of Imagination is
Infinite & Eternal whereas the world of Generation or Vegetation
is Finite & [for a small moment] Temporal    There Exist
in that Eternal World the Permanent Realities of Every Thing
which we see are reflected in this Vegetable Glass of Nature"

Vision of Last Judgment, (E 562)
"We are in a
World of Generation & death & this world we must cast off if we
would be Painters Such as Rafael  Mich Angelo & the
Ancient Sculptors. if we do not cast off this world we shall be
only Venetian Painters who will be cast off & Lost from Art" 

Vision of Last Judgment, (E 565)
    "The Player is a liar when he Says Angels are happier than
Men because they are better   Angels are happier than Men &
Devils because they are not always Prying after Good & Evil in
One Another & eating the Tree of Knowledge for Satans
Gratification"

Vision of Last Judgment, (E 565)
   "The Last Judgment is an Overwhelming of Bad Art & Science." 

Vision of Last Judgment, (E 565)
 "Some People flatter themselves
that there will be No Last Judgment & that Bad Art will be
adopted & mixed with Good Art That Error or Experiment will make
a Part of Truth & they Boast that it is its Foundation these
People flatter themselves   I will not Flatter them 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."  

Vision of Last Judgment, (E 558)
"Between the Figures of Adam & Eve appears a fiery
Gulph descending from the sea of fire Before the throne in this
Cataract Four Angels descend headlong  with four trumpets to
awake the Dead. beneath these is the Seat of the Harlot <namd>
Mystery in the Revelations.  She is [bound] siezed by
Two Beings each with three heads they Represent Vegetative
Existence.  it is written in Revelations they strip her naked
& burn her with fire    it represents the Eternal Consummation of
Vegetable Life & Death with its Lusts The wreathed Torches in
their hands represents Eternal Fire which is the fire of
Generation or Vegetation it is an Eternal Consummation Those who
are blessed with Imaginative Vision see This Eternal Female &
tremble at what others fear not while they <despise &> laugh at
what others fear"

Letters, To Butts, (E 724)
"I am not
ashamed afraid or averse to tell You what Ought to be Told.  That
I am under the direction of Messengers from Heaven Daily &
Nightly but the nature of such things is not as some suppose.
without trouble or care."

ENVISIONING THEL

First posted in 2016.

Among the things that Blake was doing in 1789 and 1790 was engraving plates for Erasmus Darwin's Botanic Garden, producing Songs of Innocence, creating the Book of Thel and studying Neoplatonism with Thomas Taylor. Each of these projects, from its own perspective, focused his attention on man's journey through the world of mortality.
 
Darwin, like Blake, was a multi-talented individual. He was a physician, a philosopher, a scientist and a poet. His Botanic Garden is a compendium of scientific thinking of his day, descriptions of plant life in sexual terms, and imaginative poems about flowering plants. His book sold well in the late eighteenth century.
 
Blake gained from Darwin exposure to the symbolic use of members of the plant kingdom, the opportunity to work closely with the mythology portrayed on the Portland Vase, and information from a wide range of the science being developed by the enlightenment.
 
The first fruit of Blake's work with Darwin's book and with his studies with Thomas Taylor, who began publishing translation of Greek literature in 1787, was his writing his illuminated Book of Thel.
 
Songs of Innocence posited a world unblemished by considerations of mortality, a world incompatible with our world of time, space and materiality. But innocence was a starting point, not a conclusion. In Thel there is commentary on Innocence. Thel contemplates the innocent Lily, Clod and Cloud in a visual world of flowers symbolizing sexual interactions. She draws back from descending into the sexual world where death is the corollary of life.
 
Like the central woman on the first compartment of the Portland Vase, Thel sits beside a crack which is opening up in the bedrock which supports her level of existence. She has been invited to explore the Mystery of mortality but has declined. Blake himself would not hold back but plunged in. He was also exploring the Swedenborgian Society at this time. Wherever he looked he found ideas which evoked images, some of which live on in the organic body of his work which grew more like a verdant landscape than an enclosed garden.

British Museum    Small Book of Designs
from Book of Thel, Page 6

Book of Thel, Plate 6, (E 6)
"The eternal gates terrific porter lifted the northern bar:
Thel enter'd in & saw the secrets of the land unknown;
She saw the couches of the dead, & where the fibrous roots
Of every heart on earth infixes deep its restless twists:
A land of sorrows & of tears where never smile was seen.

She wanderd in the land of clouds thro' valleys dark, listning
Dolours & lamentations: waiting oft beside a dewy grave
She stood in silence. listning to the voices of the ground,
Till to her own grave plot she came, & there she sat down.
And heard this voice of sorrow breathed from the hollow pit.     

Why cannot the Ear be closed to its own destruction?
Or the glistning Eye to the poison of a smile!
Why are Eyelids stord with arrows ready drawn,
Where a thousand fighting men in ambush lie?
Or an Eye of gifts & graces, show'ring fruits & coined gold!  
Why a Tongue impress'd with honey from every wind?
Why an Ear, a whirlpool fierce to draw creations in?
Why a Nostril wide inhaling terror trembling & affright.
Why a tender curb upon the youthful burning boy!
Why a little curtain of flesh on the bed of our desire?          

The Virgin started from her seat, & with a shriek.
Fled back unhinderd till she came into the vales of Har
                                    
                  The End"