Yale Center for British Art Jerusalem Plate 69, Copy E |
In the post Struggle Within I quoted from Northrop Frye this
statement:
"he realized that something profoundly new and disquieting was
coming into the world, something with unlimited possibilities for
good and for evil, which it would tax all his powers to interpret".
Blake accepted the challenge to interpret the conundrum around
him.
If Blake was motivated to address the issues of his own time and
the profound changes in the world around him, he did not view these
upheavals in isolation. An understanding of the intellectual, social
and political crises of his day could not be reached without
considering past history and evolving culture. To Blake the
development of the Enlightenment and the religion of Deism has its
roots in ancient Druid practices of sacrifice.
Perhaps this passage can be seen in the light of a transition of
Vala from her Eternal visage of beauty, love and bliss to be a
goddess who rules by selfishness, cruelty and sacrifice of others.
Urizen is the architect of the bleak and vengeful world which fails
to elevate the Divine Humanity to its rightful place in the psyche
of man.
It is reason (Urizen) who with the natural world (Vala) establishes
an order which values only outer experience at the price of inner
development. To Blake a world without imagination is a world of
'eternal despair'.
Jerusalem, Plate 65, (E 216)
"Now: now the battle rages round thy tender limbs O Vala
Now smile among thy bitter tears: now put on all thy beauty
Is not the wound of the sword sweet! & the broken bone
delightful?
Wilt thou now smile among the scythes when the wounded groan in the
field[?]
We were carried away in thousands from London; & in tens
Of thousands from Westminster & Marybone in ships closd up:
Chaind hand & foot, compelld to fight under the iron whips
Of our captains; fearing our officers more than the enemy.
Lift up thy blue eyes Vala & put on thy sapphire shoes:
O melancholy Magdalen behold the morning over Malden break;
Gird on thy flaming zone, descend into the sepulcher of Canterbury.
Scatter the blood from thy golden brow, the tears from thy silver
locks:
Shake off the waters from thy wings! & the dust from thy white
garments
Remember all thy feigned terrors on the secret couch of Lambeths
Vale
When the sun rose in glowing morn, with arms of mighty hosts
Marching to battle who was wont to rise with Urizens harps
Girt as a sower with his seed to scatter life abroad over Albion:
Arise O Vala! bring the bow of Urizen: bring the swift arrows
of light.
How rag'd the golden horses of Urizen, compelld to the chariot of
love!
Compelld to leave the plow to the ox, to snuff up the winds of
desolation
To trample the corn fields in boastful neighings: this is no
gentle harp
This is no warbling brook, nor shadow of a mirtle
tree:
But blood and wounds and dismal cries, and shadows of the
oak:
And hearts laid open to the light, by the broad grizly
sword:
And bowels hid in hammerd steel rip'd quivering on the
ground.
Call forth thy smiles of soft deceit: call forth thy cloudy tears:
We hear thy sighs in trumpets shrill when morn shall blood renew.
So sang the Spectre Sons of Albion round Luvahs Stone of Trial:
Mocking and deriding at the writhings of their Victim on
Salisbury:
Drinking his Emanation in intoxicating bliss rejoicing in Giant
dance;
For a Spectre has no Emanation but what he imbibes from decieving
A Victim! Then he becomes her Priest & she his Tabernacle.
And his Oak Grove, till the Victim rend the, woven Veil.
In the end of his sleep when Jesus calls him from his grave
Howling the Victims on the Druid Altars yield their souls
To the stern Warriors: lovely sport the Daughters round their
Victims;
Drinking their lives in sweet intoxication. hence arose from Bath
Soft deluding odours, in spiral volutions intricately winding
Over Albions mountains, a feminine indefinite cruel delusion.
Astonishd: terrified & in pain & torment. Sudden they behold
Their own Parent the Emanation of their murderd Enemy
Become their Emanation and their Temple and Tabernacle
They knew not. this Vala was their beloved Mother Vala Albions
Wife.
Terrified at the sight of the Victim: at his distorted sinews!
The tremblings of Vala vibrate thro' the limbs of Albions
Sons:
While they rejoice over Luvah in mockery & bitter scorn:
Sudden they become like what they behold in howlings & deadly
pain.
Spasms smite their features, sinews & limbs: pale they look on
one another.
They turn, contorted: their iron necks bend unwilling towards
Luvah: their lips tremble: their muscular fibres are crampd &
smitten
They become like what they behold! Yet immense in strength &
power,
PLATE 66
In awful pomp & gold, in all the precious unhewn stones of Eden
They build a stupendous Building on the Plain of Salisbury;
with chains
Of rocks round London Stone: of Reasonings: of unhewn Demonstrations
In labyrinthine arches. (Mighty Urizen the Architect.) thro
which
The Heavens might revolve & Eternity be bound in their chain.
Labour unparallelld! a wondrous rocky World of cruel destiny
Rocks piled on rocks reaching the stars: stretching from pole to
pole.
The Building is Natural Religion & its Altars Natural
Morality
A building of eternal death: whose proportions are eternal despair"
No comments:
Post a Comment