This video of Kathleen Raine, a renowned Blake scholar, talking about Blake can be viewed on youtube. Seen in the video along with Raine is the actor who played Blake in the production about Thomas Paine and William Blake. The actor is Mark Rylance who is known for being the Artistic Director of the Globe Theater.
Video - 'God is the Imagination'
Seeing Kathleen reminds me of how Larry first discovered Kathleen Raine's Blake and Tradition when he was in the sitting room of the National Gallery in Washington DC waiting for me to finish looking at pictures. The Melons were instrumental in envisioning and financing the museum and also sponsored the publication of Raine's book. So that may explain why the book was available there. After that we would sometimes go to the National Gallery just so Larry could read the book, since our local Arlington library didn't have a copy. One cold and rainy Saturday morning we went to the museum but were disappointed - the sitting room was overflowing with anti-war protesters who were looking for a warm spot to dry their clothes and feed their babies. A friend who had a friend who had borrowing privileges at the Library of Congress, borrowed the book for us so that Larry could get a longer look at it.
Read Kathleen Raine's book online.
Of this Title Page of Jerusalem, Raine says: "The soul is depicted under the classical emblem of Psyche, the butterfly. The natural universe of sun, moon, and stars is represented as 'dust on the Fly's wing' of the soul, with whose life they live. The figure at the top of the plate is, following another traditional emblem, bee-winged."
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Friday, February 26, 2010
IMAGINATION
Songs of Innocence and Experience, Nurse's Song (E 15)"When the voices of children are heard on the green
And laughing is heard on the hill,
My heart is at rest within my breast
And every thing else is still
Then come home my children, the sun is gone down
And the dews of night arise
Come come leave off play, and let us away
Till the morning appears in the skies
No no let us play, for it is yet day
And we cannot go to sleep
Besides in the sky, the little birds fly
And the hills are all coverd with sheep
Well well go & play till the light fades away
And then go home to bed
The little ones leaped & shouted & laugh'd
And all the hills ecchoed"
Here is a simple poem about playing children. But there is more than that. It is about the life of the imagination which to Blake is not a state but existence itself. We get a clue in the first verse: 'My heart is at rest within my breast, And every thing else is still.' This is the moment Blake speaks about in Milton:
PLATE 29 [31] (E 127)
For in this Period the Poets Work is Done: and all the Great
Events of Time start forth & are concievd in such a Period
Within a Moment: a Pulsation of the Artery.
Blake calls the Human Imagination the 'Divine Vision & Fruition In which Man liveth eternally.'
Imagination in children needs to recognized and cultivated, allowed expression in play and dreaming and creating. But the imagination is not outgrown. We shouldn't put our imaginations to sleep when we put away childish things. The world may try to take away our playfulness and creativity but we don't have to let it.
Romans12:2
"Don't let the world around you squeeze you into its own mould, but let God re-mould your minds from within, so that you may prove in practice that the plan of God for you is good, meets all his demands and moves towards the goal of true maturity."
Jerusalem, Plate 77 (E 231)
"I know of no other
Christianity and of no other Gospel than the liberty both of body
& mind to exercise the Divine Arts of Imagination.
Imagination the real & eternal World of which this Vegetable
Universe is but a faint shadow & in which we shall live in our
Eternal or Imaginative Bodies, when these Vegetable Mortal Bodies
are no more."
RECREATED
Blake's Sublime Allegory continues to be a fertile source for gaining understanding of Blake message. This is from the chapter, Blake's Radical Comedy, by W.J.T. Mitchell, page 305.
"The second thing we ought to notice is that the courage required for self-annihilation is not in itself sufficient to redeem either the self or the world. Milton's act would remain within the fruitless cycle of creation and destruction which continues to trap the male imagination, even after his descent, if it were not for Ololon's response, her renewal to life to balance his descent to death. Ololon's final transformation into an ark and a dove, the bearer and messenger of life amidst the annihilating flood, occurs when she casts off her false femininity. Her seeking out Milton reverses the traditional passive role of the virtuous heroine in epic and romance, but she does not escape this role by becoming a female warrior, a woman in the armor of a man. "A Female hidden in a Male, Religion hidden in War" (40:20). On the contrary, she sees that the stereotypes ruling the behavior of both sexes are the basis for the vicious cycle which entraps the best efforts of Milton and the sons of Los, and that these roles must be annihilated and recreated as human relationships before the cycle can be broken and transformed into the fruitful, liberating dialectic of contraries."
In this short passage and the pages surrounding it, we get help in understanding many of Blake's concepts.
1)First that annihilation is not the total solution for redemption. Annihilation is the 'bottom', the point where regeneration can begin in the individual and society.
2)The relationship of the male and female, the active and the receptive, are necessary ingredients in breaking the cyclical pattern called the Orc cycle (construction and destruction repeating itself.)
3)The female's role is not adopting the male's attitude of making the opposite sex into a 'commodity', but relinquishing the female attitude of jealousy of the males role as initiator.
4)The contribution of the female is to be the carrier of life and hope through which male and female can regenerate a relationship based on Human (unified), attitudes rather than Sexual (divided), attitudes.
5)Contraries are redeemed when the Negative of seeing them as being opposed to one another rather complementing one another, is annihilated.
Milton, Plate 35 [39], (E 135)
"O how the Starry Eight rejoic'd to see Ololon descended!
And now that a wide road was open to Eternity,"
Plate 40 [46] (E 142)
"But turning toward Ololon in terrible majesty Milton
Replied. Obey thou the Words of the Inspired Man
All that can be annihilated must be annihilated
That the Children of Jerusalem may be saved from slavery
There is a Negation, & there is a Contrary
The Negation must be destroyd to redeem the Contraries
The Negation is the Spectre; the Reasoning Power in Man
This is a false Body: an Incrustation over my Immortal
Spirit; a Selfhood, which must be put off & annihilated alway
To cleanse the Face of my Spirit by Self-examination.
PLATE 41 [48]
To bathe in the Waters of Life; to wash off the Not Human
I come in Self-annihilation & the grandeur of Inspiration
To cast off Rational Demonstration by Faith in the Saviour
To cast off the rotten rags of Memory by Inspiration
To cast off Bacon, Locke & Newton from Albions covering
To take off his filthy garments, & clothe him with Imagination
To cast aside from Poetry, all that is not Inspiration
Then trembled the Virgin Ololon & replyd in clouds of despair
Is this our Femin[in]e Portion the Six-fold Miltonic Female
Terribly this Portion trembles before thee O awful Man
Altho' our Human Power can sustain the severe contentions
Of Friendship, our Sexual cannot: but flies into the Ulro.
Hence arose all our terrors in Eternity! & now remembrance
Returns upon us! are we Contraries O Milton, Thou & I
O Immortal! how were we led to War the Wars of Death
Is this the Void Outside of Existence, which if enterd into
PLATE 42 [49]
Becomes a Womb? & is this the Death Couch of Albion
Thou goest to Eternal Death & all must go with thee
So saying, the Virgin divided Six-fold & with a shriek
Dolorous that ran thro all Creation a Double Six-fold Wonder!
Away from Ololon she divided & fled into the depths
Of Miltons Shadow as a Dove upon the stormy Sea.
Then as a Moony Ark Ololon descended to Felphams Vale
In clouds of blood, in streams of gore, with dreadful thunderings
Into the Fires of Intellect that rejoic'd in Felphams Vale
Around the Starry Eight: with one accord the Starry Eight became
One Man Jesus the Saviour. wonderful! round his limbs
The Clouds of Ololon folded as a Garment dipped in blood
Written within & without in woven letters: & the Writing
Is the Divine Revelation in the Litteral expression:
A Garment of War, I heard it namd the Woof of Six Thousand Years"
Jesus the Savior
"The second thing we ought to notice is that the courage required for self-annihilation is not in itself sufficient to redeem either the self or the world. Milton's act would remain within the fruitless cycle of creation and destruction which continues to trap the male imagination, even after his descent, if it were not for Ololon's response, her renewal to life to balance his descent to death. Ololon's final transformation into an ark and a dove, the bearer and messenger of life amidst the annihilating flood, occurs when she casts off her false femininity. Her seeking out Milton reverses the traditional passive role of the virtuous heroine in epic and romance, but she does not escape this role by becoming a female warrior, a woman in the armor of a man. "A Female hidden in a Male, Religion hidden in War" (40:20). On the contrary, she sees that the stereotypes ruling the behavior of both sexes are the basis for the vicious cycle which entraps the best efforts of Milton and the sons of Los, and that these roles must be annihilated and recreated as human relationships before the cycle can be broken and transformed into the fruitful, liberating dialectic of contraries."
In this short passage and the pages surrounding it, we get help in understanding many of Blake's concepts.
1)First that annihilation is not the total solution for redemption. Annihilation is the 'bottom', the point where regeneration can begin in the individual and society.
2)The relationship of the male and female, the active and the receptive, are necessary ingredients in breaking the cyclical pattern called the Orc cycle (construction and destruction repeating itself.)
3)The female's role is not adopting the male's attitude of making the opposite sex into a 'commodity', but relinquishing the female attitude of jealousy of the males role as initiator.
4)The contribution of the female is to be the carrier of life and hope through which male and female can regenerate a relationship based on Human (unified), attitudes rather than Sexual (divided), attitudes.
5)Contraries are redeemed when the Negative of seeing them as being opposed to one another rather complementing one another, is annihilated.
Milton, Plate 35 [39], (E 135)
"O how the Starry Eight rejoic'd to see Ololon descended!
And now that a wide road was open to Eternity,"
Plate 40 [46] (E 142)
"But turning toward Ololon in terrible majesty Milton
Replied. Obey thou the Words of the Inspired Man
All that can be annihilated must be annihilated
That the Children of Jerusalem may be saved from slavery
There is a Negation, & there is a Contrary
The Negation must be destroyd to redeem the Contraries
The Negation is the Spectre; the Reasoning Power in Man
This is a false Body: an Incrustation over my Immortal
Spirit; a Selfhood, which must be put off & annihilated alway
To cleanse the Face of my Spirit by Self-examination.
PLATE 41 [48]
To bathe in the Waters of Life; to wash off the Not Human
I come in Self-annihilation & the grandeur of Inspiration
To cast off Rational Demonstration by Faith in the Saviour
To cast off the rotten rags of Memory by Inspiration
To cast off Bacon, Locke & Newton from Albions covering
To take off his filthy garments, & clothe him with Imagination
To cast aside from Poetry, all that is not Inspiration
Then trembled the Virgin Ololon & replyd in clouds of despair
Is this our Femin[in]e Portion the Six-fold Miltonic Female
Terribly this Portion trembles before thee O awful Man
Altho' our Human Power can sustain the severe contentions
Of Friendship, our Sexual cannot: but flies into the Ulro.
Hence arose all our terrors in Eternity! & now remembrance
Returns upon us! are we Contraries O Milton, Thou & I
O Immortal! how were we led to War the Wars of Death
Is this the Void Outside of Existence, which if enterd into
PLATE 42 [49]
Becomes a Womb? & is this the Death Couch of Albion
Thou goest to Eternal Death & all must go with thee
So saying, the Virgin divided Six-fold & with a shriek
Dolorous that ran thro all Creation a Double Six-fold Wonder!
Away from Ololon she divided & fled into the depths
Of Miltons Shadow as a Dove upon the stormy Sea.
Then as a Moony Ark Ololon descended to Felphams Vale
In clouds of blood, in streams of gore, with dreadful thunderings
Into the Fires of Intellect that rejoic'd in Felphams Vale
Around the Starry Eight: with one accord the Starry Eight became
One Man Jesus the Saviour. wonderful! round his limbs
The Clouds of Ololon folded as a Garment dipped in blood
Written within & without in woven letters: & the Writing
Is the Divine Revelation in the Litteral expression:
A Garment of War, I heard it namd the Woof of Six Thousand Years"
Jesus the Savior
Thursday, February 25, 2010
THEL II
Blake's pictures in The Book of Thel supplement the ideas he presents in the text. In this copy of the Book of Thel from the Library of Congress, Rare Books Collection, we can read the text and view the pictures together as they were meant to be understood.
Book of Thel
First you may notice that although Blake talks of clouds, lilies, worms and clods he pictures human beings. This reinforces the idea that he is not talking about nature in general or specific parts of it, but about humans and aspects of the psyche. So the answers given by the lily and her associates are our answers, the way we explain the puzzling inconsistencies of our experience to ourselves. We may open or close ourselves to Blake's reasonings, or we may try them on for size before searching elsewhere.
On the title page we notice that Thel, the shepherdess is the observer not the participant. The sexual imagery which many people notice in Thel is apparent in the male and female soaring images on this page. Erdman (The Illuminated Blake) says 'these lovers are the human form of the Dew and the Cloud'. The flowers on this page are not the lilies of the poetry but the pasqueflower 'said to require the wind to open the petals' for fertilization.
The images surrounding the word Thel at the top of the page 3 bring to mind the four Zoas although the characters remain to be fully developed as Blake continues to write. You may recognize the soaring lady with the flying infant from the Preludium to the First Book of Urizen - it is not Urizen but a tie to his book. The man in the sky reaching for the eagle is a reminder of Los who like the eagle can represent imagination. To the right carrying shield and flaming sword is the Zoa of emotions, Luvah, who for the first time is mentioned in this poem. Reclining on the seedpod of grain is a figure in a position reminiscent of the 'renovated man' who appears above the man entering death's door in the engraving for Blair's The Grave. The picture for The Grave and the appearance of Tharmas as man's body will be later inventions but the fourfold split is already present.
Plate 4 shows Thel looking very much like the Lilly with whom she converses. Plate 5 is all text. On Plate 6 which concerns the worm, we see an image of an infant on the ground and the matron clod soaring in the air as she discusses with Thel how 'we live not for ourselves.' Thel demonstrates her astonishment. In plate 7 Thel, the observer as usual, watches the mother and child, clod and worm, as they play together. Children happily ride the serpent as the poem ends with
plate 8.
If this poem is seen to address the issues which specifically face women, those of being expected to be gentle and receptive rather than assertive and active, we may contrast it to the poem "how sweet I roamed". The latter poem represents the adolescent beginning to be aware of opportunities and abilities and facing society's limitations on the expanding possibilities. In the poem Thel, the young woman seems to be offered limited possibilities to begin with: humility and service, basking in another's attention, not reasoning, and living for others instead of for herself. This may be what Thel rejects: accepting a subservient role in a household or in a society that undervalues women. Was Blake commenting on the role of women as well as the human condition of being born into the material world?
The poem does not specifically mention the world of Generation, but the images present Generation as the world to which Thel is invited. The rejection of the feminine role or the fear of sexuality may be impediments to Thel's accepting the opportunity to enter the material world. Read the words, read the pictures, read in the context of Blake's work, read according to your own light.
Thel I
Book of Thel
First you may notice that although Blake talks of clouds, lilies, worms and clods he pictures human beings. This reinforces the idea that he is not talking about nature in general or specific parts of it, but about humans and aspects of the psyche. So the answers given by the lily and her associates are our answers, the way we explain the puzzling inconsistencies of our experience to ourselves. We may open or close ourselves to Blake's reasonings, or we may try them on for size before searching elsewhere.
On the title page we notice that Thel, the shepherdess is the observer not the participant. The sexual imagery which many people notice in Thel is apparent in the male and female soaring images on this page. Erdman (The Illuminated Blake) says 'these lovers are the human form of the Dew and the Cloud'. The flowers on this page are not the lilies of the poetry but the pasqueflower 'said to require the wind to open the petals' for fertilization.
The images surrounding the word Thel at the top of the page 3 bring to mind the four Zoas although the characters remain to be fully developed as Blake continues to write. You may recognize the soaring lady with the flying infant from the Preludium to the First Book of Urizen - it is not Urizen but a tie to his book. The man in the sky reaching for the eagle is a reminder of Los who like the eagle can represent imagination. To the right carrying shield and flaming sword is the Zoa of emotions, Luvah, who for the first time is mentioned in this poem. Reclining on the seedpod of grain is a figure in a position reminiscent of the 'renovated man' who appears above the man entering death's door in the engraving for Blair's The Grave. The picture for The Grave and the appearance of Tharmas as man's body will be later inventions but the fourfold split is already present.
Plate 4 shows Thel looking very much like the Lilly with whom she converses. Plate 5 is all text. On Plate 6 which concerns the worm, we see an image of an infant on the ground and the matron clod soaring in the air as she discusses with Thel how 'we live not for ourselves.' Thel demonstrates her astonishment. In plate 7 Thel, the observer as usual, watches the mother and child, clod and worm, as they play together. Children happily ride the serpent as the poem ends with
plate 8.
If this poem is seen to address the issues which specifically face women, those of being expected to be gentle and receptive rather than assertive and active, we may contrast it to the poem "how sweet I roamed". The latter poem represents the adolescent beginning to be aware of opportunities and abilities and facing society's limitations on the expanding possibilities. In the poem Thel, the young woman seems to be offered limited possibilities to begin with: humility and service, basking in another's attention, not reasoning, and living for others instead of for herself. This may be what Thel rejects: accepting a subservient role in a household or in a society that undervalues women. Was Blake commenting on the role of women as well as the human condition of being born into the material world?
The poem does not specifically mention the world of Generation, but the images present Generation as the world to which Thel is invited. The rejection of the feminine role or the fear of sexuality may be impediments to Thel's accepting the opportunity to enter the material world. Read the words, read the pictures, read in the context of Blake's work, read according to your own light.
Thel I
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
The Spectre
In the cold early pre-dawn, sitting beside the fire, full of joy at all life's goodness I wished that I could "annihilate my Selfhood"; then came this Vision straight from Our Heavenly Father:
Like all Blake's metaphors the Spectre has many names:
THE SELFHOOD: you'll find the word 3 times in Milton, Plate 14/15 , but the best statement is at:
Jerusalem, Plate 5
"Trembling I sit day and night, my friends are astonish'd at me. Yet they forgive my wanderings, 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, O
SATAN pervades Blake's works where it occurs 250 times. Here are a few:
In MHH Plate 5 we have the ironic viewpoint of a young Blake. Thereafter his use of Satan varies remarkably through the rest of Blake's works.
The Four Zoas [Nt 4], 56. 19-22 Erdman 338:
"And first he found the Limit of Opacity & namd it Satan
In Albions bosom for in every human bosom these limits stand
And next he found the Limit of Contraction & namd it Adam
While yet those beings were not born nor knew of good or Evil"
We can only puzzle about this one (for a post in the future).
FZ8-113[1st].1-3; E376:
" We behold with wonder Enitharmons Looms & Los's Forges
And the Spindles of Tirzah & Rahab and the Mills of Satan & Beelzeboul
In Golgonooza Los's anvils stand & his Furnaces rage"
We're in Ulro here, and Los's creative work is competing with the nihilistic "Mills of Satan & Beelzeboul" in his (our) attempt to bring about "God's kingdom on Earth" (But it won't happen!)
FZ8-107[115].22-27; E380:
" And this is the manner in which Satan became the Tempter
There is a State namd Satan learn distinct to know O Rahab
The Difference between States & Individuals of those States
The State namd Satan never can be redeemd in all Eternity
But when Luvah in Orc became a Serpent he des[c]ended into
That State calld Satan"
And you will find many other rich indications of the meanings of Satan for Blake.
THE COVERING CHERUB: Plate 37/41:
"The Virgin answerd. Knowest thou of Milton who descended
Driven from Eternity; him I seek! terrified at my Act
In Great Eternity which thou knowest! I come him to seek
So Ololon utterd in words distinct the anxious thought
Mild was the voice, but more distinct than any earthly
That Miltons Shadow heard & condensing all his Fibres
Into a strength impregnable of majesty & beauty infinite
I saw he was the Covering Cherub & within him Satan
And Raha[b]"
There are many others:
THE MATERIALIST:
All Satan has to do is to keep our minds fixed on materiality and off of anything else.
What it boils down to is that all of these things are in you and in me, and in our community, in our world as well.
on Erdman's Plate 41 of Jerusalem:
"Every man is in his Spectre's power
Until the arrival of that hour
When his Humanity awake
And cast his Spectre into the Lake."
(The mirror image of this appears in the picture.)
Like all Blake's metaphors the Spectre has many names:
THE SELFHOOD: you'll find the word 3 times in Milton, Plate 14/15 , but the best statement is at:
Jerusalem, Plate 5
"Trembling I sit day and night, my friends are astonish'd at me. Yet they forgive my wanderings, 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, O
Saviour pour upon me thy Spirit of meekness &love:THE SERPENT: In this picture we see the serpent as the tempter, wrapped around the 'human' form; he might be called Lucifer.
Annihilate the Selfhood in me, be thou all
my life!"
SATAN pervades Blake's works where it occurs 250 times. Here are a few:
In MHH Plate 5 we have the ironic viewpoint of a young Blake. Thereafter his use of Satan varies remarkably through the rest of Blake's works.
The Four Zoas [Nt 4], 56. 19-22 Erdman 338:
"And first he found the Limit of Opacity & namd it Satan
In Albions bosom for in every human bosom these limits stand
And next he found the Limit of Contraction & namd it Adam
While yet those beings were not born nor knew of good or Evil"
We can only puzzle about this one (for a post in the future).
FZ8-113[1st].1-3; E376:
" We behold with wonder Enitharmons Looms & Los's Forges
And the Spindles of Tirzah & Rahab and the Mills of Satan & Beelzeboul
In Golgonooza Los's anvils stand & his Furnaces rage"
We're in Ulro here, and Los's creative work is competing with the nihilistic "Mills of Satan & Beelzeboul" in his (our) attempt to bring about "God's kingdom on Earth" (But it won't happen!)
FZ8-107[115].22-27; E380:
" And this is the manner in which Satan became the Tempter
There is a State namd Satan learn distinct to know O Rahab
The Difference between States & Individuals of those States
The State namd Satan never can be redeemd in all Eternity
But when Luvah in Orc became a Serpent he des[c]ended into
That State calld Satan"
And you will find many other rich indications of the meanings of Satan for Blake.
THE COVERING CHERUB: Plate 37/41:
"The Virgin answerd. Knowest thou of Milton who descended
Driven from Eternity; him I seek! terrified at my Act
In Great Eternity which thou knowest! I come him to seek
So Ololon utterd in words distinct the anxious thought
Mild was the voice, but more distinct than any earthly
That Miltons Shadow heard & condensing all his Fibres
Into a strength impregnable of majesty & beauty infinite
I saw he was the Covering Cherub & within him Satan
And Raha[b]"
There are many others:
THE MATERIALIST:
All Satan has to do is to keep our minds fixed on materiality and off of anything else.
What it boils down to is that all of these things are in you and in me, and in our community, in our world as well.
on Erdman's Plate 41 of Jerusalem:
"Every man is in his Spectre's power
Until the arrival of that hour
When his Humanity awake
And cast his Spectre into the Lake."
(The mirror image of this appears in the picture.)
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
THEL I
Songs of Innocence and Experience, Song 9, (E 9)
Little Black Boy
"And we are put on earth a little space,
That we may learn to bear the beams of love,"
Title page Book of Thel
Book of Thel
In Thel we have the story of a young woman uncertain about her future, considering several possibilities and retreating to the safety of the status quo. Thel is not in this world nor in the Eternal world. She resides in a potential state, incomplete, embryonic - the seed of possibility.
She consults with the lily, the cloud, the clod and the worm seeking to learn their roles in existence. Each feels fulfilled in a limited but purposeful role. Thel has already awoken to herself as a transient illusory entity so the answers of the others are not hers. Thel passes through the northern gate and observes the generated world. Seeing her open grave she questions the conditions which define mortal life and withdraws in horror. She refuses to enter the world of Generation.
A persistent theme in Blake's poetry is that the path to Eternity goes through materiality and mortality. As stated in Little Black Boy, we must 'learn to bear the beams of love.' Thel's refusal was to that option.
We who have been born into materiality are asked to perform tasks also. Just as Thel goes through experiences which lead to her opportunity to make a choice of going on or going back, so are we offered options. Progress for us is to move in the direction of Eternity, disregarding materiality. Turning back is always Death; Life is moving on. The Eternal, Spiritual world looks like Death to those who have not developed the ability to perceive the infinite. Thel's crisis of seeing a threatening world and refusing to enter is metaphoric of our fearing to turn loose of our investment in the physical world for the promise of Eternity.
Near the end of The Four Zoas, Blake returns to the worm, flowers, clay, the veil and seed and weaves them together to generate the 'New born Man'.
You may read this Passage from The Four Zoas in our post the Web of Life.
Little Black Boy
"And we are put on earth a little space,
That we may learn to bear the beams of love,"
Title page Book of Thel
Book of Thel
In Thel we have the story of a young woman uncertain about her future, considering several possibilities and retreating to the safety of the status quo. Thel is not in this world nor in the Eternal world. She resides in a potential state, incomplete, embryonic - the seed of possibility.
She consults with the lily, the cloud, the clod and the worm seeking to learn their roles in existence. Each feels fulfilled in a limited but purposeful role. Thel has already awoken to herself as a transient illusory entity so the answers of the others are not hers. Thel passes through the northern gate and observes the generated world. Seeing her open grave she questions the conditions which define mortal life and withdraws in horror. She refuses to enter the world of Generation.
A persistent theme in Blake's poetry is that the path to Eternity goes through materiality and mortality. As stated in Little Black Boy, we must 'learn to bear the beams of love.' Thel's refusal was to that option.
We who have been born into materiality are asked to perform tasks also. Just as Thel goes through experiences which lead to her opportunity to make a choice of going on or going back, so are we offered options. Progress for us is to move in the direction of Eternity, disregarding materiality. Turning back is always Death; Life is moving on. The Eternal, Spiritual world looks like Death to those who have not developed the ability to perceive the infinite. Thel's crisis of seeing a threatening world and refusing to enter is metaphoric of our fearing to turn loose of our investment in the physical world for the promise of Eternity.
Near the end of The Four Zoas, Blake returns to the worm, flowers, clay, the veil and seed and weaves them together to generate the 'New born Man'.
You may read this Passage from The Four Zoas in our post the Web of Life.
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