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, 

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