WILLIAM BLAKE: On Vision's Wing • Part 2Companion Gallery
What makes Blake’s Songs of Innocent & of Experience a work of genius? What is the nature of vision? What is Blake’s concept of fourfold vision? Is it even graspable by the intellect? We will make the attempt. Join us for a deep dive into all of this and much more.
Below are excerpts and poems which we explore in the episode. They are shown in the order that they appear, so that listeners can follow along. Some poems are from Songs of Innocence and some from Songs of Experience, in which case an attribution is given below.
There are two instances of sister poems included: The Lamb + The Tyger and The Chimney Sweeper + The Chimney Sweeper. The first of each pair was written for Songs of Innocence, the second of each pair was written five years later for Songs of Experience.
POEMS & WRITINGS
To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour
– Excerpt from Auguries of Innocence, William Blake
Trembling I sit day and night, my friends are astonish’d at me,
Yet they forgive my wanderings, I rest not from my great task!
To open the Eternal Worlds, to open the immortal Eyes Of Man
Inwards into the Worlds of Thought: into Eternity
Ever expanding in the Bosom of God, the Human Imagination.
[…]
I must Create a System, or be enslav’d by another Man’s
I will not Reason & Compare: my business is to Create
– Excerpts from Jerusalem, William Blake
The Garden of Love
I went to the Garden of Love,
And saw what I never had seen:
A Chapel was built in the midst,
Where I used to play on the green.
And the gates of this Chapel were shut,
And Thou shalt not. writ over the door;
So I turn’d to the Garden of Love,
That so many sweet flowers bore.
And I saw it was filled with graves,
And tomb-stones where flowers should be:
And Priests in black gowns, were walking their rounds,
And binding with briars, my joys & desires.
– Poem from Songs of Experience, William Blake
The Lamb
Little Lamb who made thee?
Dost thou know who made thee?
Gave thee life & bid thee feed.
By the stream & o’er the mead;
Gave thee clothing of delight,
Softest clothing wooly bright;
Gave thee such a tender voice,
Making all the vales rejoice!
Little Lamb who made thee?
Dost thou know who made thee?
Little Lamb I’ll tell thee,
Little Lamb I’ll tell thee!
He is called by thy name,
For he calls himself a Lamb:
He is meek & he is mild,
He became a little child:
I a child & thou a lamb,
We are called by his name.
Little Lamb God bless thee.
Little Lamb God bless thee.
– Poem from Songs of Innocence, William Blake
The Tyger
Tyger Tyger, burning bright,
In the forests of the night;
What immortal hand or eye,
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
In what distant deeps or skies.
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand, dare seize the fire?
And what shoulder, & what art,
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand? & what dread feet?
What the hammer? What the chain,
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? What dread grasp,
Dare its deadly terrors clasp!
When the stars threw down their spears
And water’d heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the Lamb make thee?
Tyger Tyger burning bright,
In the forests of the night:
What immortal hand or eye,
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?
– Poem from Songs of Experience, William Blake
The Clod & The Pebble
Love seeketh not Itself to please,
Nor for itself hath any care;
But for another gives its ease,
And builds a Heaven in Hell’s despair.
So sang a little Clod of Clay,
Trodden with the cattle’s feet:
But a Pebble of the brook,
Warbled out these metres meet.
Love seeketh only Self to please,
To bind another to Its delight:
Joys in another’s loss of ease,
And builds a Hell in Heaven’s despite.
– Poem from Songs of Experience, William Blake
London
I wander thro’ each charter’d street,
Near where the charter’d Thames does flow.
And mark in every face I meet
Marks of weakness, marks of woe.
In every cry of every Man,
In every Infant’s cry of fear,
In every voice: in every ban,
The mind-forg’d manacles I hear
How the Chimney-sweepers cry
Every blackening Church appalls,
And the hapless Soldiers sigh
Runs in blood down Palace walls
But most thro’ midnight streets I hear
How the youthful Harlot’s curse
Blasts the new-born Infant’s tear
And blights with plagues the Marriage hearse.
– Poem from Songs of Experience, William Blake
The Chimney Sweeper
When my mother died I was very young,
And my father sold me while yet my tongue
Could scarcely cry “weep! ‘weep! ‘weep! ‘weep!”
So your chimneys I sweep & in soot I sleep.
There’s little Tom Dacre, who cried when his head
That curled like a lamb’s back, was shaved, so I said,
“Hush, Tom! never mind it, for when your head’s bare,
You know that the soot cannot spoil your white hair.”
And so he was quiet, & that very night,
As Tom was a-sleeping he had such a sight!
That thousands of sweepers, Dick, Joe, Ned, & Jack,
Were all of them locked up in coffins of black;
And by came an Angel who had a bright key,
And he opened the coffins & set them all free;
Then down a green plain, leaping, laughing they run,
And wash in a river and shine in the Sun.
Then naked & white, all their bags left behind,
They rise upon clouds, and sport in the wind.
And the Angel told Tom, if he’d be a good boy,
He’d have God for his father & never want joy.
And so Tom awoke; and we rose in the dark
And got with our bags & our brushes to work.
Though the morning was cold, Tom was happy & warm;
So if all do their duty, they need not fear harm
– Poem from Songs of Innocence, William Blake
The Chimney Sweeper
A little black thing among the snow,
Crying “weep! ‘weep!” in notes of woe!
“Where are thy father and mother? say?”
“They are both gone up to the church to pray.
Because I was happy upon the heath,
And smil’d among the winter’s snow,
They clothed me in the clothes of death,
And taught me to sing the notes of woe.
And because I am happy and dance and sing,
They think they have done me no injury,
And are gone to praise God and his Priest and King,
Who make up a heaven of our misery.”
– Poem from Songs of Experience, William Blake
A Poison Tree
I was angry with my friend;
I told my wrath, my wrath did end.
I was angry with my foe:
I told it not, my wrath did grow.
And I water’d it in fears,
Night & morning with my tears:
And I sunned it with smiles,
And with soft deceitful wiles.
And it grew both day and night.
Till it bore an apple bright.
And my foe beheld it shine,
And he knew that it was mine.
And into my garden stole,
When the night had veil’d the pole;
In the morning glad I see;
My foe outstretch’d beneath the tree.
– Poem from Songs of Experience, William Blake
William Blake’s Letter to Thomas Butts (as it appears in Chapter 3: The Nature of Vision)
To Thomas Butts, November 22nd, 1802.
Dear Sir,
After I had finish’d my Letter I found that I had not said half what I intended to say & in particular I wish to ask you what subject you choose to be painted on the remaining Canvas which I brought down with me (for there were three) and to tell you that several of the Drawings were in great forwardness. You will see by the Inclosed Account that the remaining Number of Drawings which you gave me orders for is Eighteen.
I will finish these with all possible Expedition if indeed I have not tired you or as it is politely call’d Bored you too much already or if you would rather cry out Enough Off Off! Tell me in a Letter of forgiveness if you were offended & of accustom’d friendship if you were not. But I will bore you more with some Verses which My Wife desires me to Copy out & send you with her kind love & Respect.
They were Composed a twelvemonth ago. Walking from Felpham to Lavant to meet my Sister…
With happiness stretch’d 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
And little devils who fight for themselves
Remembering the Verses that Hayley sung
When my heart knock’d 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
Fill’d full of hopes fill’d 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 betray’d
For here does Theotormon lower
And here is Enitharmon’s bower
And Los the terrible thus hath sworn
Because thou backward dost return
[…]
So I spoke & struck in my wrath
The old man weltering upon my path
Then Los appear’d in all his power
In the Sun he appear’d descending before
My face in fierce flames In my double sight
Twas outward a Sun: inward Los in his might
“My hands are labour’d 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 life’s 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 array’d
Thy terrors shall not make me afraid.”
When I had my Defiance given
The Sun stood trembling in heaven
The Moon that glow’d remote below
Became leprous & white as snow
And every Soul of men on the Earth
Felt affliction & sorrow & sickness & dearth
Los flam’d 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 Beulah’s night
And twofold Always. May God us keep
From Single vision & Newton’s sleep […]
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