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THE VOICE OF THE ANCIENT BARDYouth of delight come hither,And see the opening morn,Image of truth new born.Doubt is fled & clouds of reason,Dark disputes & artful teazing.Folly is an endless maze.Tangled roots perplex her ways,How many have fallen there!They stumble all night over bones of the dead:And feel they know not what but care:And wish to lead others when they should be led. THE BOOK of THEL (1789) THEL'S Motto, Does the Eagle know what is in the pit? Or wilt thou go ask the Mole: Can Wisdom be put in a silver rod? Or Love in a golden bowl?THEL I The daughters of Mne Seraphim led round their sunny flocks. All but the youngest; she in paleness sought the secret air. To fade away like morning beauty from her mortal day: Down by the river of Adona her soft voice is heard: And thus her gentle lamentation falls like morning dew. O life of this our spring! why fades the lotus of the water? Why fade these children of the spring? born but to smile & fall. Ah! Thel is like a watry bow. and like a parting cloud. Like a reflection in a glass. like shadows in the water. Like dreams of infants. like a smile upon an infants face, Like the doves voice, like transient day, like music in the air; Ah! gentle may I lay me down, and gentle rest my head. And gentle sleep the sleep of death. and gentle hear the voice Of him that walketh in the garden in the evening time. The Lilly of the valley breathing in the humble grass Answer'd the lovely maid and said; I am a watry weed, And I am very small, and love to dwell in lowly vales; So weak, the gilded butterfly scarce perches on my head. Yet I am visited from heaven and he that smiles on all. Walks in the valley. and each morn over me spreads his hand Saying, rejoice thou humble grass, thou new-born lilly flower, Thou gentle maid of silent valleys. and of modest brooks; For thou shalt be clothed in light, and fed with morning manna: Till summers heat melts thee beside the fountains and the springs To flourish in eternal vales: then why should Thel complain, Why should the mistress of the vales of Har, utter a sigh. She ceasd & smild in tears, then sat down in her silver shrine. Thel answerd. O thou little virgin of the peaceful valley. Giving to those that cannot crave, the voiceless, the o'ertired. t6 Thy breath doth nourish the innocent lamb, he smells thy milky garments, He crops thy flowers. while thou sittest smiling in his face, Wiping his mild and meekin mouth from all contagious taints. Thy wine doth purify the golden honey, thy perfume, Which thou dost scatter on every little blade of grass Revives the milked cow, & tames the fire-breathing steed. But Thel is like a faint cloud kindled at the rising sun: I vanish from my pearly throne, and who shall find my Queen of the vales the Lilly answerd, ask the tender cloud, And it shall tell thee why it glitters in the morning sky, And why it scatters its bright beauty thro' the humid air. Descend O little cloud & hover before the eyes of Thel. The Cloud descended, and the Lilly bowd her modest head: And went to mind her numerous charge among the verdant grass.II. O little Cloud the virgin said, I charge thee tell to me, Why thou complainest not when in one hour thou fade away: Then we shall seek thee but not find; ah Thel is like to thee. I pass away. yet I complain, and no one hears my voice. The Cloud then shew'd his golden head & his bright form emerg'd, Hovering and glittering on the air before the face of Thel. O virgin know'st thou not. our steeds drink of the golden springs Where Luvah doth renew his horses: look'st thou on my youth, And fearest thou because I vanish and am seen no more. Nothing remains; O maid I tell thee, when I pass away, It is to tenfold life, to love, to peace, and raptures holy: Unseen descending, weigh my light wings upon balmy flowers; And court the fair eyed dew. to take me to her shining tent; The weeping virgin, trembling kneels before the risen sun, Till we arise link'd in a golden band, and never part; But walk united, bearing food to all our tender flowers Dost thou O little Cloud? I fear that I am not like thee; For I walk through the vales of Har. and smell the sweetest flowers; But I feed not the little flowers: I hear the warbling birds, But I feed not the warbling birds. they fly and seek their food; But Thel delights in these no more because I fade away, And all shall say, without a use this shining woman liv'd, Or did she only live. to be at death the food of worms. The Cloud reclind upon his airy throne and answer'd thus. Then if thou art the food of worms. O virgin of the skies, How great thy use. how great thy blessing; every thing that lives, Lives not alone, nor for itself: fear not and I will call The weak worm from its lowly bed, and thou shalt hear its voice. Come forth worm of the silent valley, to thy pensive queen. The helpless worm arose, and sat upon the Lillys leaf, And the bright Cloud saild on, to find his partner in the vale.III. Then Thel astonish'd view'd the Worm upon its dewy bed. Art thou a Worm? image of weakness. art thou but a Worm? I see thee like an infant wrapped in the Lillys leaf: Ah weep not little voice, thou can'st not speak. but thou can'st weep; Is this a Worm? I see thee lay helpless & naked: weeping, And none to answer, none to cherish thee with mothers smiles. The Clod of Clay heard the Worms voice, & raisd her pitying head; She bowd over the weeping infant, and her life exhal'd In milky fondness, then on Thel she fix'd her humble eyes. O beauty of the vales of Har. we live not for ourselves, Thou seest me the meanest thing, and so I am indeed; My bosom of itself is cold. and of itself is dark, But he that loves the lowly, pours his oil upon my head. And kisses me, and binds his nuptial bands around my breast. And says; Thou mother of my children, I have loved thee. And I have given thee a crown that none can take away But how this is sweet maid, I know not, and I cannot know, I ponder, and I cannot ponder; yet I live and love. The daughter of beauty wip'd her pitying tears with her white veil, And said. Alas! I knew not this, and therefore did I weep: That God would love a Worm I knew, and punish the evil foot That wilful, bruis'd its helpless form: but that he cherish'd it With milk and oil, I never knew; and therefore did I weep, And I complaind in the mild air, because I fade away, And lay me down in thy cold bed, and leave my shining lot. Queen of the vales, the matron Clay answerd; I heard thy sighs. And all thy moans flew o'er my roof. but I have call'd them down: Wilt thou O Queen enter my house. 'tis given thee to enter, And to return; fear nothing. enter with thy virgin feet.IV. The eternal gates terrific porter lifted the northern bar: Thel enter'd in & saw the secrets of the land unknown; She saw the couches of the dead, & where the fibrous roots Of every heart on earth infixes deep its restless twists: A land of sorrows & of tears where never smile was seen. She wanderd in the land of clouds thro' valleys dark, listning Dolours & lamentations: waiting oft beside a dewy grave She stood in silence. listning to the voices of the ground, Till to her own grave plot she came, & there she sat down. And heard this voice of sorrow breathed from the hollow pit. Why cannot the Ear be closed to its own destruction? Or the glistning Eye to the poison of a smile! Why are Eyelids stord with arrows ready drawn, Where a thousand fighting men in ambush lie? Or an Eye of gifts & graces, show'ring fruits & coined gold! Why a Tongue impress'd with honey from every wind? Why an Ear, a whirlpool fierce to draw creations in? Why a Nostril wide inhaling terror trembling & affright. Why a tender curb upon the youthful burning boy! t7 Why a little curtain of flesh on the bed of our desire? The Virgin started from her seat, & with a shriek. Fled back unhinderd till she came into the vales of Har The End THE MARRIAGE of HEAVEN and HELL The Argument. Rintrah roars & shakes his fires in theHungry clouds swag on the deep Once meek, and in a perilous path,The just man kept his course alongThe vale of death.Roses are planted where thorns grow.And on the barren heathSing the honey bees. Then the perilous path was planted:And a river, and a springOn every cliff and tomb;And on the bleached bonesRed clay brought forth. Till the villain left the paths of ease,To walk in perilous paths, and driveThe just man into barren climes. Now the sneaking serpent walksIn mild humility.And the just man rages in the wildsWhere lions roam. Rintrah roars & shakes his fires in theHungry clouds swag on the deep.____________________________________________ As a new heaven is begun, and it is now thirty-three years since its advent: the Eternal Hell revives. And lo! Swedenborg is the Angel sitting at the tomb; his writings are the linen clothes folded up. Now is the dominion of Edom, & the return of Adam into Paradise; see Isaiah XXXIV & XXXV Chap: 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. The voice of the Devil All Bibles or sacred codes. have been the causes of the following Errors. 1. That Man has two real existing principles Viz: a Body & a Soul. 2 That Energy. calld Evil. is alone from the Body. & that Reason. calld Good. is alone from the Soul. 3. That God will torment Man in Eternity for following his Energies. But the following Contraries to these are True 1 Man has no Body distinct from his Soul for that calld Body is a portion of Soul discernd by the five Senses. the chief inlets of Soul in this age 2. Energy is the only life and is from the Body and Reason is the bound or outward circumference of Energy. 3 Energy is Eternal Delight Those who restrain desire, do so because theirs is weak enough to be restrained; and the restrainer or reason usurps its place & governs the unwilling. And being restraind it by degrees becomes passive till it is only the shadow of desire. The history of this is written in Paradise Lost. & the Governor or Reason is call'd Messiah. And the original Archangel or possessor of the command of the heavenly host, is calld the Devil or Satan and his children are call'd Sin & Death But in the Book of Job Miltons Messiah is call'd Satan. For this history has been adopted by both parties It indeed appear'd to Reason as if Desire was cast out. but the Devils account is, that the Messiah fell. & formed a heaven of what he stole from the Abyss This is shewn in the Gospel, where he prays to the Father to send the comforter or Desire that Reason may have Ideas to build on, the Jehovah of the Bible being no other than he, who dwells in flaming fire. Know that after Christs death, he became Jehovah. But in Milton; the Father is Destiny, the Son, a Ratio of the five senses. & the Holy-ghost, Vacuum! Note. The reason Milton wrote in fetters when he wrote of Angels & God, and at liberty when of Devils & Hell, is because he was a true Poet and of the Devils party without knowing it A Memorable Fancy. As I was walking among the fires of hell, delighted with the enjoyments of Genius; which to Angels look like torment and insanity. I collected some of their Proverbs: thinking that as the sayings used in a nation, mark its character, so the Proverbs of Hell, shew the nature of Infernal wisdom better than any description of buildings or garments. When I came home; on the abyss of the five senses, where a flat sided steep frowns over the present world. I saw a mighty Devil folded in black clouds, hovering on the sides of the rock, with corroding fires he wrote the following sentence now percieved by the minds of men, & read by them on earth. How do you know but ev'ry Bird that cuts the airy way, Is an immense world of delight, clos'd by your senses five? Proverbs of Hell. In seed time learn, in harvest teach, in winter enjoy. Drive your cart and your plow over the bones of the dead. The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom. Prudence is a rich ugly old maid courted by Incapacity. He who desires but acts not, breeds pestilence. The cut worm forgives the plow. Dip him in the river who loves water. A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees. He whose face gives no light, shall never become a star. Eternity is in love with the productions of time. The busy bee has no time for sorrow. The hours of folly are measur'd by the clock, but of wisdom: no measure. All wholsom food is caught without a net or a trap. Bring out number weight & measure in a year of dearth. No bird soars too high. if he soars with his own wings. A dead body. revenges not injuries. The most sublime act is to set another before you. If the fool would persist in his folly he would become wise Folly is the cloke of knavery. Shame is Prides cloke. Prisons are built with stones of Law, Brothels with bricks of The pride of the peacock is the glory of God. The lust of the goat is the bounty of God. The wrath of the lion is the wisdom of God. The nakedness of woman is the work of God. Excess of sorrow laughs. Excess of joy weeps. The roaring of lions, the howling of wolves, the raging of the stormy sea, and the destructive sword. are portions of eternity too great for the eye of man. The fox condemns the trap, not himself. Joys impregnate. Sorrows bring forth. Let man wear the fell of the lion. woman the fleece of the sheep. The bird a nest, the spider a web, man friendship. The selfish smiling fool. & the sullen frowning fool shall be both thought wise. that they may be a rod. What is now proved was once, only imagin'd. The rat, the mouse, the fox, the rabbet; watch the roots, the the horse, the elephant, watch the fruits. The cistern contains: the fountain overflows One thought. fills immensity. Always be ready to speak your mind, and a base man will avoid you. Every thing possible to be believ'd is an image of truth. The eagle never lost so much time, as when he submitted to learn The fox provides for himself. but God provides for the lion. Think in the morning, Act in the noon, Eat in the evening, Sleep He who has sufferd you to impose on him knows you. As the plow follows words, so God rewards prayers. The tygers of wrath are wiser than the horses of instruction Expect poison from the standing water. You never know what is enough unless you know what is more than Listen to the fools reproach! it is a kingly title! The eyes of fire, the nostrils of air, the mouth of water, the The weak in courage is strong in cunning. The apple tree never asks the beech how he shall grow, nor the how he shall take his prey. The thankful reciever bears a plentiful harvest. If others had not been foolish. we should be so. The soul of sweet delight. can never be defil'd, When thou seest an Eagle, thou seest a portion of Genius lift up As the catterpiller chooses the fairest leaves to lay her eggs on, lays his curse on the fairest joys. To create a little flower is the labour of ages. Damn. braces: Bless relaxes. The best wine is the oldest. the best water the newest. Prayers plow not! Praises reap not! Joys laugh not! Sorrows weep not! The head Sublime, the heart Pathos, the genitals Beauty, the handsProportion. As the air to a bird or the sea to a fish, so is contempt to theThe crow wish'd every thing was black, the owl, that every thing Exuberance is Beauty. If the lion was advised by the fox. he would be cunning. Improvement makes strait roads, but the crooked roads withoutImprovement, are roads of Genius. t148 Sooner murder an infant in its cradle than nurse unacted desires Where man is not nature is barren. Truth can never be told so as to be understood, and not be Enough! or Too much The ancient Poets animated all sensible objects with Gods orGeniuses calling them by the names and adorning them with theproperties of woods, rivers, mountains, lakes, cities, nations,and whatever their enlarged & numerous senses could percieve.And particularly they studied the genius of each city &country. placing it under its mental deity.Till a system was formed, which some took advantage of &enslav'd the vulgar by attempting to realize or abstract themental deities from their objects: thus began Priesthood.Choosing forms of worship from poetic tales.And at length they pronounced that the Gods had orderd suchthings.Thus men forgot that All deities reside in the human breast. A Memorable Fancy. The Prophets Isaiah and Ezekiel dined with me, and I askedthem how they dared so roundly to assert. that God spake to them;and whether they did not think at the time, that they would bemisunderstood, & so be the cause of imposition.Isaiah answer'd. I saw no God. nor heard any, in a finiteorganical perception; but my senses discover'd the infinite inevery thing, and as I was then perswaded. & remain confirm'd;that the voice of honest indignation is the voice of God, I carednot for consequences but wrote.Then I asked: does a firm perswasion that a thing is so, make itHe replied. All poets believe that it does, & in ages of this firm perswasion removed mountains; but many are not capableof a firm perswasion of any thing.Then Ezekiel said. The philosophy of the east taught the firstprinciples of human perception some nations held oneprinciple for the origin & some another, we of Israel taughtthat the Poetic Genius (as you now call it) was the firstprinciple and all the others merely derivative, which was thecause of our despising the Priests & Philosophers of othercountries, and propheying that all Gods would at last beproved. to originate in ours & to be the tributaries of thePoetic Genius, it was this. that our great poet King Daviddesired so fervently & invokes so patheticly, saying by this heconquers enemies & governs kingdoms; and we so loved our God.that we cursed in his name all the deities of surroundingnations, and asserted that they had rebelled; from these opinionsthe vulgar came to think that all nations would at last besubject to the jews.This said he, like all firm perswasions, is come to pass, for allnations believe the jews code and worship the jews god, and whatgreater subjection can beI heard this with some wonder, & must confess my ownconviction. After dinner I ask'd Isaiah to favour the world withhis lost works, he said none of equal value was lost. Ezekielsaid the same of his.I also asked Isaiah what made him go naked and barefoot threeyears? he answerd, the same that made our friend Diogenes theI then asked Ezekiel. why he eat dung, & lay so long on hisright & left side? he answerd. the desire of raising other meninto a perception of the infinite this the North American tribespractise. & is he honest who resists his genius or conscience.only for the sake of present ease or gratification?The ancient tradition that the world will be consumed in fireat the end of six thousand years is true. as I have heard fromFor the cherub with his flaming sword is hereby commanded toleave his guard at the tree of life, and when he does, the wholecreation will be consumed, and appear infinite. and holy whereasit now appears finite & corrupt.This will come to pass by a improvement of sensual enjoyment.But first the notion that man has a body distinct from hissoul, is to be expunged; this I shall do, by printing in theinfernal method, by corrosives, which in Hell are salutary andmedicinal, melting apparent surfaces away, and displaying theinfinite which was hid.If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing wouldappear to man as it is: infinite.For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro'narrow chinks of his cavern. A Memorable Fancy I was in a Printing house in Hell & saw the method in whichknowledge is transmitted from generation to generation.In the first chamber was a Dragon-Man, clearing away therubbish from a caves mouth; within, a number of Dragons werehollowing the cave,In the second chamber was a Viper folding round the rock & thecave, and others adorning it with gold silver and precious stones.In the third chamber was an Eagle with wings and feathers ofair, he caused the inside of the cave to be infinite, around werenumbers of Eagle like men, who built palaces in the immense cliffs.In the fourth chamber were Lions of flaming fire raging around& melting the metals into living fluids.In the fifth chamber were Unnam'd forms, which cast the metalsinto the expanse.There they were reciev'd by Men who occupied the sixthchamber, and took the forms of books & were arranged in libraries. The Giants who formed this world into its sensual existenceand now seem to live in it in chains; are in truth the causesof its life & the sources of all activity, but the chains are,the cunning of weak and tame minds. which have power to resistenergy. according to the proverb, the weak in courage is strongin cunning.Thus one portion of being, is the Prolific. the other, theDevouring: to the devourer it seems as if the producer was inhis chains, but it is not so, he only takes portions of existenceand fancies that the whole.But the Prolific would cease to be Prolific unless theDevourer as a sea recieved the excess of his delights.Some will say, Is not God alone the Prolific? I answer, Godonly Acts & Is, in existing beings or Men.These two classes of men are always upon earth, & they shouldbe enemies; whoever tries to reconcile them seeks to destroyReligion is an endeavour to reconcile the two.Note. Jesus Christ did not wish to unite but to seperatethem, as in the Parable of sheep and goats! & he says I came notto send Peace but a Sword.Messiah or Satan or Tempter was formerly thought to be one ofthe Antediluvians who are our Energies. A Memorable Fancy An Angel came to me and said. O pitiable foolish young man!O horrible! O dreadful state! consider the hot burning dungeonthou art preparing for thyself to all eternity, to which thou artgoing in such career.I said. perhaps you will be willing to shew me my eternallot & we will contemplate together upon it and see whether yourlot or mine is most desirableSo he took me thro' a stable & thro' a church & down intothe church vault at the end of which was a mill: thro' the millwe went, and came to a cave. down the winding cavern we gropedour tedious way till a void boundless as a nether sky appeardbeneath us & we held by the roots of trees and hung over thisimmensity; but I said, if you please we will commit ourselvesto this void and see whether providence is here also, if youwill not I will? but he answerd. do not presume O young-man butas we here remain behold thy lot which will soon appear when thedarkness passes awaySo I remaind with him sitting in the twisted root ofan oak. he was suspended in a fungus which hung with the headdownward into the deep:By degrees we beheld the infinite Abyss, fiery as the smokeof a burning city; beneath us at an immense distance was the sun,black but shining[;] round it were fiery tracks on which revolv'dvast spiders, crawling after their prey; which flew or ratherswum in the infinite deep, in the most terrific shapes of animalssprung from corruption. & the air was full of them, & seemdcomposed of them; these are Devils. and are called Powers of theair, I now asked my companion which was my eternal lot? he said,between the black & white spidersBut now, from between the black & white spiders a cloud andfire burst and rolled thro the deep blackning all beneath, sothat the nether deep grew black as a sea & rolled with a terriblenoise: beneath us was nothing now to be seen but a black tempest,till looking east between the clouds & the waves, we saw acataract of blood mixed with fire and not many stones throw fromus appeard and sunk again the scaly fold of a monstrous serpent.at last to the east, distant about three degrees appeard a fierycrest above the waves slowly it reared like a ridge of goldenrocks till we discoverd two globes of crimson fire. from whichthe sea fled away in clouds of smoke, and now we saw, it was thehead of Leviathan. his forehead was divided into streaks of green& purple like those on a tygers forehead: soon we saw his mouth &red gills hang just above the raging foam tinging the black deepwith beams of bood, advancing toward us with all thefury of a spiritual existence.My friend the Angel climb'd up from his station into the mill;I remain'd alone, & then this appearance was no more, but I found myself sitting on a pleasant bank beside a river by moon lighthearing a harper who sung to the harp. & his theme was, The manwho never alters his opinion is like standing water, & breedsreptiles of the mind.But I arose, and sought for the mill, & there I found myAngel, who surprised asked me, how I escaped?I answerd. All that we saw was owing to your metaphysics: forwhen you ran away, I found myself on a bank by moonlight hearinga harper, But now we have seen my eternal lot, shall I shew youyours? he laughd at my proposal: but I by force suddenly caughthim in my arms, & flew westerly thro' the night, till we wereelevated above the earths shadow: then I flung myself with himdirectly into the body of the sun, here I clothed myself inwhite, & taking in my hand Swedenborgs volumes sunk from theglorious clime, and passed all the planets till we came tosaturn, here I staid to rest & then leap'd into the void, betweensaturn & the fixed stars.Here said I! is your lot, in this space, if space it may becalld, Soon we saw the stable and the church, & I took him to thealtar and open'd the Bible, and lo! it was a deep pit, into whichI descended driving the Angel before me, soon we saw seven housesof brick, one we enterd; in it were anumber of monkeys,baboons, & all of that species chaind by the middle, grinning andsnatching at one another, but witheld by the shortness of theirchains: however I saw that they sometimes grew numerous, and thenthe weak were caught by the strong and with a grinning aspect,first coupled with & then devourd, by plucking off first one limband then another till the body was left a helpless trunk thisafter grinning & kissing it with seeming fondness they devourdtoo; and here & there I saw one savourily picking the flesh offof his own tail; as the stench terribly annoyd us both we wentinto the mill, & I in my hand brought the skeleton of a body,which in the mill was Aristotles Analytics.So the Angel said: thy phantasy has imposed upon me & thououghtest to be ashamed.I answerd: we impose on one another, & it is but lost timeto converse with you whose works are only Analytics. Opposition is true Friendship. I have always found that Angels have the vanity to speak ofthemselves as the only wise; this they do with a confidentinsolence sprouting from systematic reasoning:Thus Swedenborg boasts that what he writes is new; tho' itis only the Contents or Index of already publish'd booksA man carried a monkey about for a shew, & because he was alittle wiser than the monkey, grew vain, and conciev'd himself aswiser than seven men. It is so with Swedenborg; he shews thefolly of churches & exposes hypocrites, till he imagines that allare religious. & himself the single one on earth that ever broke aNow hear a plain fact: Swedenborg has not written one newtruth: Now hear another: he has written all the old falshoods.And now hear the reason. He conversed with Angels who areall religious, & conversed not with Devils who all hate religion,for he was incapable thro' his conceited notions.Thus Swedenborgs writings are a recapitulation of allsuperficial opinions, and an analysis of the more sublime, but noHave now another plain fact: Any man of mechanical talentsmay from the writings of Paracelsus or Jacob Behmen, produce tenthousand volumes of equal value with Swedenborg's.and from those of Dante or Shakespear, an infinite number.But when he has done this, let him not say that he knowsbetter than his master, for he only holds a candle in sunshine. A Memorable Fancy Once I saw a Devil in a flame of fire. who arose before anAngel that sat on a cloud. and the Devil utterd these words.The worship of God is. Honouring his gifts in other meneach according to his genius. and loving the greatest menbest, those who envy or calumniate great men hate God, for thereis no other God.The Angel hearing this became almost blue but masteringhimself he grew yellow, & at last white pink & smiling, and thenThou Idolater, is not God One? & is not he visible in JesusChrist? and has not Jesus Christ given his sanction to the law often commandments and are not all other men fools, sinners, &The Devil answer'd; bray a fool in a morter with wheat. yetshall not his folly be beaten out of him: if Jesus Christ is thegreatest man, you ought to love him in the greatest degree; nowhear how he has given his sanction to the law of tencommandments: did he not mock at the sabbath, and so mock thesabbaths God? murder those who were murderd because of him? turnaway the law from the woman taken in adultery? steal the labor ofothers to support him? bear false witness when he omitted makinga defence before Pilate? covet when he pray'd for his disciples,and when he bid them shake off the dust of their feet againstsuch as refused to lodge them? I tell you, no virtue can existwithout breaking these ten commandments: Jesus was all virtue,and acted from impulse: not from rules.When he had so spoken: I beheld the Angel who stretched outhis arms embracing the flame of fire & he was consumed and aroseas Elijah. Note. This Angel, who is now become a Devil, is myparticular friend: we often read the Bible together in itsinfernal or diabolical sense which the world shall have if theybehave wellI have also: The Bible of Hell: which the world shall havewhether they will or no. One Law for the Lion & Ox is Oppression A Song of Liberty 1. The Eternal Female groand! it was heard over all the Earth:2. Albions coast is sick silent; the American meadows faint!3 Shadows of Prophecy shiver along by the lakes and the riversand mutter across the ocean! France rend down thy dungeon;4. Golden Spain burst the barriers of old Rome;5. Cast thy keys O Rome into the deep down falling, even toeternity down falling,6. And weep!7. In her trembling hands she took the new, born terror howling;8. On those infinite mountains of light now barr'd out by theatlantic sea, the new born fire stood before the starry king!9. Flag'd with grey brow'd snows and thunderous visages thejealous wings wav'd over the deep.10. The speary hand burned aloft, unbuckled was the shield,forth went the hand of jealousy among the flaming hair, andhurl'd the new born wonder thro' the starry night.11. The fire, the fire, is falling!12. Look up! look up! O citizen of London. enlarge thycountenance; O Jew, leave counting gold! return to thy oil andwine; O African! black African! (go. winged thought widen his13. The fiery limbs, the flaming hair,shot like the sinking suninto the western sea.14. Wak'd from his eternal sleep, the hoary, element roaring fled15. Down rushd beating his wings in vain the jealous king: hisgrey brow'd councellors, thunderous warriors, curl'd veterans,among helms, and shields, and chariots horses, elephants:banners, castles, slings and rocks,16. Falling, rushing, ruining! buried in the ruins, on Urthona's17. All night beneath the ruins, then their sullen flames fadedemerge round the gloomy king,18. With thunder and fire: leading his starry hosts thro' the wastehe promulgates his ten commands,glancing his beamy eyelids over the deep in dark dismay,19. Where the son of fire in his eastern cloud, while themorning plumes her golden breast,20. Spurning the clouds written with curses, stamps the stonylaw to dust, loosing the eternal horses from the dens of night, Empire is no more! and now the lion & wolf shall cease. Chorus Let the Priests of the Raven of dawn, no longer in deadlyblack, with hoarse note curse the sons of joy. Nor his acceptedbrethren whom, tyrant, he calls free; lay the bound or build theroof. Nor pale religious letchery call that virginity, thatwishes but acts not!For every thing that lives is HolyDate: 2015-12-18; view: 568
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