JOY & SORROW

British Museum
Illustrations to Young's Night Thoughts

It is impossible to avoid adversity. In every life rain falls, pain is experienced, struggles are encountered, disappointments threaten to overwhelm. If something can't be avoided, it must be assimilated and integrated.

The fabric of life is woven from multiple threads which come from diverse sources. It is not ours to select the threads which form the warp and woof providing the texture of the fabric. The woof is the basic ingredients which are given as the individual's inherited circumstances. The warp is the path that the individual travels as he moves along through life. From these threads we weave those outward appearances from which our self-perception is formed. We present this to the world as our persona but it is only a covering for the essential being which is the Eternal Soul. 

Letters, To William Hayley, October 7. 1803 (E 736)
"Yet I laugh & sing for if on Earth neglected I am in
heaven a Prince among Princes & even on Earth beloved by the Good
as a Good Man   this I should be perfectly contented with but at
certain periods a blaze of reputation arises round me in which I
am considerd as one distinguishd by some mental perfection but
the flame 
soon dies again & I am left stupified & astonishd   O that I
could live as others do in a regular succession of Employment
this wish I fear is not to be accomplishd to me--Forgive this
Dirge-like lamentation over a dead horse & now I have lamented
over the dead horse let me laugh & be merry with my friends till
Christmas for as Man liveth not by bread alone I shall live altho
I should want bread--nothing is necessary to me but to do my Duty
& to rejoice in the exceeding joy that is always poured out on my
Spirit. to pray that my friends & you above the rest may be made
partakers of the joy that the world cannot conceive that you may
still be replenishd with the same & be as you always have been a
glorious & triumphant Dweller in immortality.  Please to pay for
me my best thanks to Miss Poole tell her that I wish her a
continued Excess of Happiness--some say that Happiness is not
Good for Mortals & they ought to be answerd that Sorrow is not
fit for Immortals & is utterly useless to any one a blight never
does good to a tree & if a blight kill not a tree but it still
bear fruit let none say that the fruit was in consequence of the
blight."

Auguries of Innocence, (E 491)
"It is right it should be so 
Man was made for Joy & Woe
And when this we rightly know
Thro the World we safely go
Joy & Woe are woven fine
A Clothing for the soul divine 
Under every grief & pine
Runs a joy with silken twine
The Babe is more than swadling Bands
Throughout all these Human Lands
Tools were made & Born were hands 
Every Farmer Understands
Every Tear from Every Eye
Becomes a Babe in Eternity
This is caught by Females bright
And returnd to its own delight"

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