ZOES PERSONIFIED

Blake Archive

Fitzwilliam Museum

Book of Urizen 

Plate 24

If we enter into Blake's divisions of the human psyche, they take on lives of their own. Lets look within at the fallen aspects of the Zoas which we can identify within ourselves. Do we recognize Orc as the fiery agent of change which incessantly struggles of break the chains of conformity to the status quo? Can we see Satan within our brains building structures to restrict and confine us in order to prevent us from fulfilling our potential for development? Is there a Los in us who accepts the task of awaking the sleeping imagination through which we can shed the confines of time and space? And can we escape from the idea that the body is the real and that the spirit is the transitory, which prevents us from reentering Eden?  

Our undisclosed lives are the lives of the Zoas - our emotions: Luvah, our reasoning: Urizen, our intuition: Urthona, our senses: Tharmas. Self knowledge can calm the battles that rage within.

Jerusalem, Plate 38 [43], (E 184)
"They saw their Wheels rising up poisonous against Albion
Urizen, cold & scientific: Luvah, pitying & weeping
Tharmas, indolent & sullen: Urthona, doubting & despairing
Victims to one another & dreadfully plotting against each other
To prevent Albion walking about in the Four Complexions." 

Element         Eternal Name       Worldly Name

Fire                Luvah                    Orc

Air                  Urizen                   Satan

Earth              Urthona                Los

Water             Tharmas              Cherub with Flaming Sword           

Milton, Plate 13, (E 158)  

"Shadowy to those who dwell not in them, meer possibilities:
But to those who enter into them they seem the only substances   
For every thing exists & not one sigh nor smile nor tear,
Plate 14
One hair nor particle of dust, not one can pass away.

He views the Cherub at the Tree of Life, also the Serpent,
Orc the first born coild in the south: the Dragon Urizen:
Tharmas the Vegetated Tongue even the Devouring Tongue:
A threefold region, a false brain: a false heart:                
And false bowels: altogether composing the False Tongue,
Beneath Beulah: as a watry flame revolving every way
And as dark roots and stems: a Forest of affliction, growing
In seas of sorrow."

Marriage of Heaven and Hell, Plate 14, (E 39)

   "The ancient tradition that the world will be consumed in fire
at the  end of six thousand years is true. as I have heard from
Hell.
   For the cherub with his flaming sword is hereby commanded to 
leave his guard at the tree of life, and when he does, the whole 
creation will be consumed, and appear infinite. and holy whereas
it now  appears finite & corrupt." 

Genesis 1

[23] Therefore the LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken.
[24] So he drove out the man; and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life.

Milton, Plate 39 [45, (E 158)

"loud Satan thunderd on the stormy Sea
Circling Albions Cliffs in which the Four-fold World resides     
Tho seen in fallacy outside: a fallacy of Satans Churches
Plate 40 [46]
Before Ololon Milton stood & percievd the Eternal Form
Of that mild Vision; wondrous were their acts by me unknown
Except remotely; and I heard Ololon say to Milton

I see thee strive upon the Brooks of Arnon. there a dread
And awful Man I see, oercoverd with the mantle of years.   
I behold Los & Urizen. I behold Orc & Tharmas;
The Four Zoa's of Albion & thy Spirit with them striving
In Self annihilation giving thy life to thy enemies
Are those who contemn Religion & seek to annihilate it
Become in their Feminine portions the causes & promoters       
Of these Religions, how is this thing? this Newtonian Phantasm
This Voltaire & Rousseau: this Hume & Gibbon & Bolingbroke
This Natural Religion! this impossible absurdity"

Wikipedia Commons
Illustrations for Paradise Lost
Butts Set, Picture 12 

Job Picture 17

Illustrations of the Book of Job

Plate 17

First Posted July 2010

 

Job's relation to God is healed; Job and his wife blessed; the friends turn their backs.

Note the difference here between the light side and the dark side.

What does it mean that the three "friends" are hiding their eyes. Recall that the three friends represent Job's shadow side; Blake referred to that variously as the Spectre, the covering cherub, Satan, etc. etc.

Blake inscribed oodles of Bible verses above and below the central image of this picture:

1 Samuel 2:6 "he bringeth down to the grave, and bringeth up."

Psalm 8:3-4 "When I behold [consider] thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained

4 What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him?"

 

1 John 3:2 "...we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is."

 

John 10:30 "I and my Father are one."

 

John 14:9  "he that hath seen me hath seen the Father"

John 14:20 "At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you."

John 14:28 "If ye loved me, ye would rejoice, because I said, I go unto the Father"

John 14:7  "If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him."

 

John 14:11 "Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me"

 

John 14:21 "he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him."

 

John 14:23 "and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him."

 

John 14:16-17 "he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;
17 Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive" 

John 14:17 "for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you."

 

Job 42:5 "I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear but now mine eye seeth thee."

Blake lived into this picture and identified closely with it. The rhapsodic scripture he wrote below it was a tribute to the Bible, which he loved and a witness to his creative relationship with the O.T. God. He was thinking about that First Vision of Light where God called him "thou ramhorn'd with Gold":

"In his bosom sun bright I remaind.
Soft he smild And I heard his voice
Mild Saying This is My Fold O thou Ram hornd with gold
Who awakest from sleep"

THANKSGIVING

Illustrations of the Book of Job

Job's Sacrifice

Linnell set, Plate 18

Legend on engraved plate:

                               "And my Servant Job shall pray for you

And the Lord turned the captivity of Job when he prayed for his Friends

also: Matthew 5

[44] But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;
[45] That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.
[46] For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same?
[47] And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so?
[48] Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.

When Blake had determined that he would return to London after his three years sojourn in Felpham, he wrote this heart-felt letter to his spiritual friend and corporeal supporter Thomas Butts. Blake felt moved to thank Butts for being a person who knew him well enough that he recognized God's workings in him. Butts would lift him up when he was despondent over the alienation which he suffered because of his ability to "See Visions, Dream Dreams, & prophecy & speak Parables."   

Letters, To Butts,(E 728)
"Felpham April 25: 1803
My Dear Sir
     I write in haste having recievd a pressing Letter from my
Brother.  I intended to have sent the Picture of the Riposo which
is nearly finishd much to my satisfaction but not quite you shall
have it soon.  I now send the 4 Numbers for Mr Birch with best
Respects to him <The Reason the Ballads have been suspended is
the pressure of other business but they will go on again soon>
     Accept of my thanks for your kind & heartening Letter You
have Faith in the Endeavours of Me your weak brother & fellow
Disciple. how great must be your faith in our Divine Master.  You
are to me a Lesson of Humility while you Exalt me by such
distinguishing commendations.  I know that you see certain merits
in me which by Gods Grace shall be made fully apparent & perfect
in Eternity. in the mean time I must not bury the Talents in the
Earth but do my endeavour to live to the Glory of our Lord &
Saviour & I am also grateful to the kind hand that endeavours to
lift me out of despondency even if it lifts me too high--
     And now My Dear Sir Congratulate me on my return to London
with the full approbation of Mr Hayley & with Promise--But Alas!
     Now I may say to you what perhaps I should not dare to say
to any one else.  That I can alone carry on my visionary studies
in London unannoyd & that I may converse with my friends in
Eternity.  See Visions, Dream Dreams, & prophecy & speak Parables
unobserv'd & at liberty from the Doubts of other Mortals. perhaps
Doubts proceeding from Kindness. but Doubts are always pernicious
Especially when we Doubt our Friends Christ is very decided on
this Point.  "He who is Not With Me is Against Me" There is no
Medium or Middle state & if a Man is the Enemy of my Spiritual
Life while he pretends to be the Friend of my Corporeal. he is a
Real Enemy--but the Man may be the friend of my Spiritual Life
while he seems the Enemy of my Corporeal but Not Vice Versa
     What is very pleasant.  Every one who hears of my going to
London again Applauds it as the only course for the interest of
all concernd in My Works.  Observing that I ought not to be away
from the opportunities London affords of seeing fine Pictures and
the various improvements in Works of Art going on in London
     But none can know the Spiritual Acts of my three years
Slumber on the banks of the Ocean unless he has seen them in the
Spirit or unless he should read My long Poem descriptive of those
Acts for I have in these three years composed an immense number
of verses on One Grand Theme Similar to Homers Iliad or Miltons
Paradise Lost the Person & Machinery intirely new to the
Inhabitants of Earth (some of the Persons Excepted) I have written
this Poem from immediate Dictation twelve or sometimes twenty or
thirty lines at a time without Premeditation & even against my
Will. the Time it has taken in writing was thus renderd Non
Existent. & an immense Poem Exists which seems to be the Labour
of a long Life all producd without Labour or Study.  I mention
this to shew you what I think the Grand Reason of my being
brought down here
     I have a thousand & ten thousand things to say to you.  My
heart is full of futurity.  I percieve that the sore travel which
has been given me these three years leads to Glory & Honour.  I
rejoice & I tremble "I am fearfully & wonderfully made".  I had
been reading the cxxxix Psalm a little before your Letter
arrived.  I take your advice.  I see the face of my Heavenly
Father he lays his Hand upon my Head & gives a blessing to all my
works why should I be troubled why should my heart & flesh cry
out.  I will go on in the Strength of the Lord through Hell will
I sing forth his Praises. that the Dragons of the Deep may praise
him & that those who dwell in darkness & on the Sea coasts may be
gatherd into his Kingdom.  Excuse my perhaps too great
Enthusiasm.  Please to accept of & give our Loves to Mrs Butts &
your amiable Family. & believe me to be----

Ever Yours Affectionately
WILL. BLAKE. "

Psalms 139

[7] Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence?
[8] If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.
[9] If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea;
[10] Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.

The 'Long Poem' on 'One Grand Theme' which Blake was composing in Felpham was of course Jerusalem which he labored over for many more years. In this passage from Plate 12 we read of the the building of Golgonooza, the city of Art & Manufacture, which would embody the characteristics through which the Kingdom of Heaven is made manifest on earth.

Characteristics of Golgonooza

pity

compassion

love 

kindness 

mercy 

forgiveness

honesty 

words never forgotten

humility 

devotion  

thanksgiving

tears and sighs 

Galatians 5

[22] But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith,
[23] Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.

Jerusalem, Plate 12, (E 155)

"Terrified at the sublime Wonder, Los stood before his Furnaces.
And they stood around, terrified with admiration at Erins Spaces
For the Spaces reachd from the starry heighth, to the starry depth;
And they builded Golgonooza: terrible eternal labour!

What are those golden builders doing? where was the burying-place
Of soft Ethinthus? near Tyburns fatal Tree? is that
Mild Zions hills most ancient promontory; near mournful
Ever weeping Paddington? is that Calvary and Golgotha?
Becoming a building of pity and compassion? Lo!
The stones are pity, and the bricks, well wrought affections:    
Enameld with love & kindness, & the tiles engraven gold
Labour of merciful hands: the beams & rafters are forgiveness:
The mortar & cement of the work, tears of honesty: the nails,
And the screws & iron braces, are well wrought blandishments,
And well contrived words, firm fixing, never forgotten,         
Always comforting the remembrance: the floors, humility,
The cielings, devotion: the hearths, thanksgiving:
Prepare the furniture O Lambeth in thy pitying looms!
The curtains, woven tears & sighs, wrought into lovely forms
For comfort. there the secret furniture of Jerusalems chamber    
Is wrought: Lambeth! the Bride the Lambs Wife loveth thee:
Thou art one with her & knowest not of self in thy supreme joy.

Go on, builders in hope: tho Jerusalem wanders far away,
Without the gate of Los: among the dark Satanic wheels."

From an earlier post: 

Those who build their lives as expressions of the 13th Chapter of First Corinthians are the 'golden builders'; they are 'becoming a building' - carefully built just as Blake's illuminated poetry was produced with 'well wrought blandishments' and 'well contrived words.' The structure of Golgonooza is the principles and attitudes through which we build our character, the furnishings are the way we behave to one another: 'curtains woven tears and sighs, woven into lovely forms.' The outcome is the 'joy' of losing the 'self' by knowing the love in which we abide, and which abides in us.

BLAKE'S INFINITY 3

Wikipedia Commons
Illustration to Ballads by Hayley

 I went to Fearful Symmetry by Northrop Frye to seek information about Blake's Finite and Infinite, and found instead Becoming and Being. The Finite world is the world of Becoming, while the Infinite world is the world of Being. In the finite world nothing is permanent; change is the corollary of living in time and space. The definite remains, it endures. But without a defined 'identity' man passes through states as he travels his journey. 

---

Milton, PLATE 30 [33], (E 129) 

"But the Emanations trembled exceedingly, nor could they
Live, because the life of Man was too exceeding unbounded
His joy became terrible to them they trembled & wept
Crying with one voice. Give us a habitation & a place
In which we may be hidden under the shadow of wings              
For if we who are but for a time, & who pass away in winter
Behold these wonders of Eternity we shall consume
But you O our Fathers & Brothers, remain in Eternity
But grant us a Temporal Habitation. do you speak
To us; we will obey your words as you obey Jesus                 
The Eternal who is blessed for ever & ever. Amen 

Fearful Symmetry, Page 47:

"The real man, therefore, is the total form of the creative acts and visions which he evolves in the course of his 'Becoming' life. The latter exists in time and space, But his 'Being' or real existence is a work of art, and exists, like the work of art, in the unity of time and space which is infinite and eternal. The imagination or Being, then, is immortal, a form constructed out of time but existing in what Paul calls the 'fullness of time.' We arrive at the conception of immortality as soon as we grasp the idea of the reality which is not merely a part of an indefinite persistence of an indefinitely extensive physical world. But for that very reason immortality cannot mean the indefinite survival of a 'Becoming' life arrested at some point in its development...as in most conceptions of an immortal personality. What is immortal about the man is the total form of his creative acts, and these total forms are the characters, or 'identities,' as Blake calls them, of the men who made them, the isolating of what is eternally humane in them from the accidents of Becoming. ...those good deeds are the eternal reality of Everyman, the spiritual form of Everyman."   

Milton, Plate 22 [24],(E 117) 

"I am that Shadowy Prophet who Six Thousand Years ago    
Fell from my station in the Eternal bosom. Six Thousand Years
Are finishd. I return! both Time & Space obey my will.
I in Six Thousand Years walk up and down: for not one Moment
Of Time is lost, nor one Event of Space unpermanent
But all remain: every fabric of Six Thousand Years               
Remains permanent: tho' on the Earth where Satan
Fell, and was cut off all things vanish & are seen no more
They vanish not from me & mine, we guard them first & last
The generations of men run on in the tide of Time
But leave their destind lineaments permanent for ever & ever.    

So spoke Los as we went along to his supreme abode."

Jerusalem, Plate 13, (E 157)

"Golgonooza: Los walks round the walls night and day.             

He views the City of Golgonooza, & its smaller Cities:
The Looms & Mills & Prisons & Work-houses of Og & Anak:
The Amalekite: the Canaanite: the Moabite: the Egyptian:
And all that has existed in the space of six thousand years:
Permanent, & not lost not lost nor vanishd, & every little act,
Word, work, & wish, that has existed, all remaining still
In those Churches ever consuming & ever building by the Spectres
Of all the inhabitants of Earth wailing to be Created:
Shadowy to those who dwell not in them, meer possibilities:
But to those who enter into them they seem the only substances   
For every thing exists & not one sigh nor smile nor tear,
Plate 14
One hair nor particle of dust, not one can pass away."

Jerusalem, Plate 31 [35], (E 177)

 "And the appearance of a Man was seen in the Furnaces;            
Saving those who have sinned from the punishment of the Law,
(In pity of the punisher whose state is eternal death,)
And keeping them from Sin by the mild counsels of his love.

Albion goes to Eternal Death: In Me all Eternity.
Must pass thro' condemnation, and awake beyond the Grave!
No individual can keep these Laws, for they are death
To every energy of man, and forbid the springs of life;
Albion hath enterd the State Satan! Be permanent O State!
And be thou for ever accursed! that Albion may arise again:
And be thou created into a State! I go forth to Create           
States: to deliver Individuals evermore! Amen.

So spoke the voice from the Furnaces, descending into Non-Entity
[To Govern the Evil by Good: and States abolish
     Systems.]" 

Jerusalem, Plate 32 [36], (E 178) 

"These are States Permanently Fixed by the Divine Power

The Atlantic Continent sunk round Albions cliffy shore
And the Sea poured in amain upon the Giants of Albion      
As Los bended the Senses of Reuben Reuben is Merlin
Exploring the Three States of Ulro; Creation; Redemption. & Judgment

And many of the Eternal Ones laughed after their manner

Have you known the judgment that is arisen among the
Zoa's of Albion? where a Man dare hardly to embrace              
His own Wife, for the terrors of Chastity that they call
By the name of Morality. their Daughters govern all
In hidden deceit! they are Vegetable only fit for burning
Art & Science cannot exist but by Naked Beauty displayd

Then those in Great Eternity who contemplate on Death            
Said thus. What seems to Be: Is: To those to whom
It seems to Be, & is productive of the most dreadful
Consequences to those to whom it seems to Be: even of
Torments, Despair, Eternal Death; but the Divine Mercy
Steps beyond and Redeems Man in the Body of Jesus Amen           
And Length Bredth Highth again Obey the Divine Vision Hallelujah
Plate 33 [37]
And One stood forth from the Divine Family &,said 

I feel my Spectre rising upon me! Albion! arouze thyself!" 

Jerusalem, Plate 73, (E 229)

"As the Pilgrim passes while the Country permanent remains
So Men pass on: but States remain permanent for ever" 

Jerusalem, Plate 75, (E 230)

"For Los in Six Thousand Years walks up & down continually
That not one Moment of Time be lost & every revolution
Of Space he makes permanent in Bowlahoola & Cathedron." 

Laocoon, (E 273)

"The Eternal Body of Man is The IMAGINATION.
          God himself  |
that is                |<Hebrew>[Yeshua] JESUS We are his Members
        The Divine Body|

It manifests itself in his Works of Art (In Eternity All is
     Vision)
All that we See is VISION from Generated Organs gone as soon as
     come
Permanent in The Imagination; considered as Nothing by the
     NATURAL MAN"

Vision of The Last Judgment, (E 554)

     "The Last judgment is one of these Stupendous
Visions. I have represented it as I saw it.
to different People it appears differently as every
thing else does for tho on Earth things seem Permanent they are
less permanent than a Shadow as we all know too well
     The Nature of Visionary Fancy or Imagination is very little
Known & the Eternal nature & permanence of its ever Existent
Images is considerd as less permanent than the things of
Vegetative & Generative Nature yet the Oak dies as well as the
Lettuce but Its Eternal Image & Individuality never dies. but
renews by its seed. just [as] <so> the Imaginative Image
returns according to the seed of Contemplative
Thought the Writings of the Prophets illustrate these conceptions
of the Visionary Fancy by their various sublime & Divine Images
as seen in the Worlds of Vision" 

Vision of The Last Judgment, (E 555)

 "This world of Imagination is the World of
Eternity it is the Divine bosom into which we shall all go after
the death of the Vegetated body   This World of Imagination is
Infinite & Eternal whereas the world of Generation or Vegetation
is Finite & [for a small moment] Temporal    There Exist
in that Eternal World the Permanent Realities of Every Thing
which we see are reflected in this Vegetable Glass of Nature" 

SYMBOLISM

Wikipedia Commons

Book of Urizen

Plate 4, Copy A

Northrop Frye and Foster Damon each included in his definitive Blake book a helpful chart showing associations of symbols with the individual Zoas. Frye used The Four Zoas as his reference point whereas Damon used Jerusalem. Below are selected associations from their charts.

Fearful Symmetry, Frye, page 277:

In Four Zoas

1. Eternal Name    Luvah              Urizen            Tharmas            Urthona

2. Time Name        Orc                  Satan                C. Cherub            Fancy

3. Sense                 Nose                Eye                  Tongue                 Ear

4. Position              Center              Zenith              Circumference      Nadir

5. Nature                Stars                 Sun                 Moon                Mountains

6. Element              Fire                   Air                   Water                    Earth

7. Place                  Soil                   City                 Garden             Underground

8. Virtue                 Love                  Faith                Hope                   Vision 

9. Vice                    Hatred              Doubt               Despair             Dullness

 

A Blake Dictionary by Damon, page 212:

In Jerusalem - Fourfold Correspondence

1. Name             Urthona                 Luvah              Urizen               Tharmas 

2. Meanings       Imagination            Emotions            Reason              Senses         

3. Places             Nadir                     Center                Zenith                Circumference

4. Desires            Friendship             Love                   Hunger                Lust  

5. Worlds             Eternity                  Beulah                Ulro                     Generation

6. Sense               Ears                      Nostrils               Eyes                    Tongue

7. Elements          Earth                      Fire                    Air                       Water

8. Symbols            Sun                        Moon                 Stars                  Earth

---

Jerusalem, Plate 97, (E 256) 

 "Then Albion stretchd his hand into Infinitude.
And took his Bow. Fourfold the Vision for bright beaming Urizen
Layd his hand on the South & took a breathing Bow of carved Gold
Luvah his hand stretch'd to the East & bore a Silver Bow bright shining
Tharmas Westward a Bow of Brass pure flaming richly wrought   
Urthona Northward in thick storms a Bow of Iron terrible thundering.

And the Bow is a Male & Female & the Quiver of the Arrows of Love,
Are the Children of this Bow: a Bow of Mercy & Loving-kindness: laying
Open the hidden Heart in Wars of mutual Benevolence Wars of Love"

CIRCUMFERENCE

Wikipedia Commons

Europe a Prophecy

Frontispiece

Energy is from the body - Tharmas. The outward circumference of Energy is reason - Urizen.

Marriage of Heaven and Hell, Plate 4, (E 34) 

"2. Energy is the only life and is from the Body and Reason is
the bound or outward circumference of Energy."

In The Blake Dictionary Damon tells us that in Great Eternity the West or the Circumference is the outward body - Tharmas; the Zenith is the Head - Urizen; the Nadir is the depths within - Urthona: and the Center is the heart - Luvah.

Jerusalem, Plate 12, (E 156)

"And the Four Points are thus beheld in Great Eternity
West, the Circumference: South, the Zenith: North,               
The Nadir: East, the Center, unapproachable for ever.
These are the four Faces towards the Four Worlds of Humanity
In every Man. Ezekiel saw them by Chebars flood.
And the Eyes are the South, and the Nostrils are the East.
And the Tongue is the West, and the Ear is the North." 

The Four Zoas exist in each human. The complexity in each Zoa gives rise to dual perspectives for viewing our world. Externally events have one meaning, whereas Internally the meaning is different. Seen from the perspective of Vala all is material; from the perspective of Jerusalem all is spiritual.  

Jerusalem, Plate 18,(E 162)

"From every-one of the Four Regions of Human Majesty,
There is an Outside spread Without, & an Outside spread Within
Beyond the Outline of Identity both ways, which meet in One:
An orbed Void of doubt, despair, hunger, & thirst & sorrow.
Here the Twelve Sons of Albion, join'd in dark Assembly,         
Jealous of Jerusalems children, asham'd of her little-ones
(For Vala produc'd the Bodies. Jerusalem gave the Souls)" 

The process of closing the circumference darkens the center. When the individual loses the cohesiveness which the body provides he becomes subject to the whims of the emotions. Love and jealousy begin to dominate, making wholeness difficult to maintain.

Jerusalem, Plate 19,(E 164)

"Willing the Friends endur'd, for Albions sake, and for
Jerusalem his Emanation shut within his bosom;
Which hardend against them more and more; as he builded onwards  
On the Gulph of Death in self-righteousness, that roll'd
Before his awful feet, in pride of virtue for victory:
And Los was roofd in from Eternity in Albions Cliffs
Which stand upon the ends of Beulah, and withoutside, all
Appear'd a rocky form against the Divine Humanity. 

Albions Circumference was clos'd: his Center began darkning
Into the Night of Beulah, and the Moon of Beulah rose
Clouded with storms: Los his strong Guard walkd round beneath the Moon
And Albion fled inward among the currents of his rivers."

Within man is his sanctuary, his inner life, which is uncovered when Jesus rends the veil of dominance by moral law.  

Jerusalem, Plate 69, (E 223) 

"Hence the Infernal Veil grows in the disobedient Female:
Which Jesus rends & the whole Druid Law removes away
From the Inner Sanctuary: a False Holiness hid within the Center,
For the Sanctuary of Eden. is in the Camp: in the Outline,
In the Circumference: & every Minute Particular is Holy:
Embraces are Cominglings: from the Head even to the Feet;
And not a pompous High Priest entering by a Secret Place.

Jerusalem pined in her inmost soul over Wandering Reuben         
As she slept in Beulahs Night hid by the Daughters of Beulah" 

When Albion turns away from the Divine Vision, he turns outward to his selfish center, his emanative life. Damon calls Albion's Sons his affections or the States of his Center.

Jerusalem , Plate 71, (E 224) 

"As the Soul is to the Body, so Jerusalems Sons,
Are to the Sons of Albion: and Jerusalem is Albions Emanation    

What is Above is Within, for every-thing in Eternity is translucent:
The Circumference is Within: Without, is formed the Selfish Center
And the Circumference still expands going forward to Eternity.
And the Center has Eternal States! these States we now explore."

Unity within the lineaments of man is achieved when the four senses are joined within the circumference to experience forgiveness of sins and self annihilation.  

Jerusalem, Plate 98,(E 257)

"South stood the Nerves of the Eye. East in Rivers of bliss the Nerves of the
Expansive Nostrils West, flowd the Parent Sense the Tongue. North stood
The labyrinthine Ear. Circumscribing & Circumcising the excrementitious
Husk & Covering into Vacuum evaporating revealing the lineaments of Man
Driving outward the Body of Death in an Eternal Death & Resurrection   
Awaking it to Life among the Flowers of Beulah rejoicing in Unity
In the Four Senses in the Outline the Circumference & Form, for ever
In Forgiveness of Sins which is Self Annihilation. it is the Covenant of Jehovah"

---

Annotations to Swedenborg, (E 604)

"Swedenborg - ... But he who knows how to elevate his Mind above
the Ideas of Thought which are derived from Space and Time, such
a Man passes from Darkness to Light, and becomes wise in Things
spiritual and Divine . . . and then by Virtue of that Light he
shakes off the Darkness of natural Light, and removes its
Fallacies from the Center to the Circumference. 

Blake - When the fallacies of darkness are in the circumference they
cast a bound about the infinite" 

READING SYMBOLS

BLAKE'S INFINITY 2

Wikipedia Commons

Book of Ahania

Plate 2

If we see through the limitations of the natural eye we see only the things of the natural or material world. When the expansive world of spiritual reality becomes visible to us, we may Be as God Is - inclusive, infinite.

THERE is NO NATURAL RELIGION, VII, (E 2)

"Application.   He who sees the Infinite in all things sees
God.  He who sees the Ratio only sees himself only.

Therefore God becomes as we are, that we may be as he is"

The material eye is not capable of seeing the immaterial. The finite cannot see the infinite. But the senses can be transformed to perceive the whole in each and every part. Thus is one opened to infinity.   

Marriage of Heaven and Hell, Plate 15, (E 38)

 "Isaiah answer'd. I saw no God. nor heard any, in a finite
organical perception; but my senses discover'd the infinite in
every thing, and as I was then perswaded. & remain confirm'd;
that the voice of honest indignation is the voice of God, I cared
not for consequences but  wrote." 

This passage shows results of beholding the infinite. External objects have changed appearances. The hidden characteristics of things are revealed.  

Marriage of Heaven and Hell, Plate 18, (E 41)

 "By degrees we beheld the infinite Abyss, fiery as the smoke 
of a burning city; beneath us at an immense distance was the sun,
black but shining[;] round it were fiery tracks on which revolv'd
vast spiders, crawling after their prey; which flew or rather
swum in the infinite deep, in the most terrific shapes of animals
sprung from corruption. & the air was full of them, & seemd
composed of them; these are Devils. and are called Powers of the
air, I now asked my companion which was my eternal lot? he said,
between the black & white spiders"

Through seeing infinitely Blake was able to discern his poetic vision.

 Marriage of Heaven and Hell, Plate 25, (E 44) 

 "A Song of Liberty

 8.  On those infinite mountains of light now barr'd out by the
atlantic sea, the new born fire stood before the starry king! 

Visions of Daughters of Albion, Plate 10, (E 55)

"On those vast shady hills between America & Albions shore;       
Now barr'd out by the Atlantic sea: call'd Atlantean hills:
Because from their bright summits you may pass to the Golden world
An ancient palace, archetype of mighty Emperies,
Rears its immortal pinnacles, built in the forest of God" 

Harold Bloom, Blake's Apocalypse, Page 128 states:

"Desire shall fail, but the gates are consumed, and man is opened to infinity if he but see his own freedom."

 

PROTECTION OF ART

Wikipedia Commons 

Illustrations to Dante's Divine Comedy

Baffled Devils Fighting

Northrop Frye wrote on Page 265 of Fearful Symmetry:

"Art protects us against nature: it would be impossible to find pleasure in tragedy or laugh at the predicaments of comedy if we did not feel this protection. In nature there is misery, in art tragedy: in nature there is mysterious evil, in art ghost stories. This does not mean that art allows us to escape from nature: it allows us to undertake its imaginative conquest. The reasoner peers myopically out into an indefinite world, finds that he can see only a little way into it, even with the aid of instruments which 'alter the ratio,' reaches the blindness and ignorance at the circumference of his vision, and reports that man lives, as far as he can see, in a cave shrouded in darkness. The artist, by putting concrete images into a mental form, makes the familiar intelligible; and art does what all civilization does: it transforms nature into a home. This is what Blake means when he shows us the sons of Los creating the concrete imagery of art as a protection for the cringing, fighting, hysterical spectres of abstract thought which are born of the direct exposure of the mind to nature:

Milton, Plate 28 [30], (E 125)
'The little weeping Spectre stands on the threshold of Death      
Eternal; and sometimes two Spectres like lamps quivering
And often malignant they combat (heart-breaking sorrowful & piteous)
Antamon takes them into his beautiful flexible hands,
As the Sower takes the seed, or as the Artist his clay
Or fine wax, to mould artful a model for golden ornaments,      
The soft hands of Antamon draw the indelible line:
Form immortal with golden pen; such as the Spectre admiring
Puts on the sweet form; then smiles Antamon bright thro his windows'"

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Immediately before the above passage Blake wrote:

Milton, Plate 27 [29] 

"But in Eternity the Four Arts: Poetry, Painting, Music,          
And Architecture which is Science: are the Four Faces of Man.
Not so in Time & Space: there Three are shut out, and only
Science remains thro Mercy: & by means of Science, the Three
Become apparent in time & space, in the Three Professions
Poetry in Religion: Music, Law: Painting, in Physic & Surgery: 
That Man may live upon Earth till the time of his awaking,
And from these Three, Science derives every Occupation of Men.
And Science is divided into Bowlahoola & Allamanda.
Plate 28 [30]
Some Sons of Los surround the Passions with porches of iron & silver
Creating form & beauty around the dark regions of sorrow,
Giving to airy nothing a name and a habitation
Delightful! with bounds to the Infinite putting off the Indefinite
Into most holy forms of Thought: (such is the power of inspiration)
They labour incessant; with many tears & afflictions:
Creating the beautiful House for the piteous sufferer.

Others; Cabinets richly fabricate of gold & ivory;
For Doubts & fears unform'd & wretched & melancholy"

---

Because Art to Blake is an expression of the imagination it carries the weight of transforming thought to inspiration. Release from the cave which limits the ability to see the world as it is - INFINITE and ETERNAL - becomes possible by creating and comprehending art. Through the arts of 'Poetry, Painting, Music, And Architecture' there is opened a direct link to the portion of the mind that is capable of immediate experience of completeness or Infinity.