William Blake: His Life, Character, and Genius

Front Cover
S. Sonnenschein & Company, 1893 - Literary Criticism - 160 pages
 

Contents

I
1
II
29
III
57
IV
82
V
113
VI
136

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Page 129 - 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. I will not cease from mental fight, Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand Till we have built Jerusalem In England's green and pleasant land.
Page 86 - PIPING down the valleys wild, Piping songs of pleasant glee, On a cloud I saw a child, And he laughing said to me : "Pipe a song about a Lamb !
Page 87 - Little lamb, who made thee? Dost thou know who made thee, Gave thee life, and bid thee feed By the stream and o'er the mead; Gave thee clothing of delight, Softest clothing, woolly, 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, and He is mild, He became a little child. I a child, and thou a lamb,...
Page 97 - Without Contraries is no progression. Attraction and Repulsion, Reason and Energy, Love and Hate, are necessary to Human existence. From these contraries spring what the religious call Good & Evil. Good is the passive that obeys Reason. Evil is the active springing from Energy. Good is Heaven. Evil is Hell.
Page 82 - Till I the prince of love beheld, Who in the sunny beams did glide! He shew'd me lilies for my hair, And blushing roses for my brow; He led me through his gardens fair Where all his golden pleasures grow. With sweet May dews my wings were wet, And Phoebus fir'd my vocal rage; He caught me in his silken net, And shut me in his golden cage.
Page 29 - God's eternal store, to circumscribe This universe, and all created things. One foot he centred, and the other turn'd Round through the vast profundity obscure, And said, Thus far extend, thus far thy bounds, This be thy just circumference, O world.
Page 86 - Piper, sit thee down and write In a book that all may read." So he vanished from my sight; And I plucked a hollow reed, And I made a rural pen, And I stained the water clear, And I wrote my happy songs Every child may joy to hear.
Page 153 - Poetry consists in these conceptions; and shall Painting be confined to the sordid drudgery of fac-simile representations of merely mortal and perishing substances, and not be, as poetry and music are, elevated into its own proper sphere of invention and visionary conception ? No, it shall not be so ! Painting, as well as poetry and music, exists and exults in immortal thoughts.
Page 107 - Does the whale worship at thy footsteps as the hungry dog; Or does he scent the mountain prey because his nostrils wide Draw in the ocean ? Does his eye discern the flying cloud As the raven's eye ; or does he measure the expanse like the vulture ? Does the still spider view the cliffs where eagles hide their young ; Or does the fly rejoice because the harvest is brought in ? Does not the eagle scorn the earth, and despise the treasures beneath ? But the mole knoweth what is there, and the worm shall...
Page 138 - 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...

References to this book

The Life of William Blake
Mona Wilson
No preview available - 1971

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