<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=38306" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>The Book of Urizen</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">PRELUDIUM TO THE [FIRST] BOOK OF URIZEN</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Of the primeval Priests assum'd power,<br>When Eternals spurn'd back his religion;<br>And gave him a place in the north,<br>Obscure, shadowy, void, solitary.<br>Eternals I hear your call gladly,<br>Dictate swift winged words, & fear not<br>To unfold your dark visions of torment.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Chap: I</div><div style="margin:10px 0">1. Lo, a shadow of horror is risen<br>In Eternity! Unknown, unprolific!<br>Self-closd, all-repelling: what Demon<br>Hath form'd this abominable void<br>This soul-shudd'ring vacuum? — Some said<br>"It is Urizen", But unknown, abstracted<br>Brooding secret, the dark power hid.<br> <br>2. Times on times he divided, & measur'd<br>Space by space in his ninefold darkness<br>Unseen, unknown! changes appeard<br>In his desolate mountains rifted furious<br>By the black winds of perturbation<br> <br>3. For he strove in battles dire<br>In unseen conflictions with shapes<br>Bred from his forsaken wilderness,<br>Of beast, bird, fish, serpent & element<br>Combustion, blast, vapour and cloud.<br> <br>4. Dark revolving in silent activity:<br>Unseen in tormenting passions;<br>An activity unknown and horrible;<br>A self-contemplating shadow,<br>In enormous labours occupied<br> <br>5. But Eternals beheld his vast forests<br>Age on ages he lay, clos'd, unknown<br>Brooding shut in the deep; all avoid<br>The petrific abominable chaos<br> <br>6. His cold horrors silent, dark Urizen<br>Prepar'd: his ten thousands of thunders<br>Rang'd in gloom'd array stretch out across<br>The dread world, & the rolling of wheels<br>As of swelling seas, sound in his clouds<br>In his hills of stor'd snows, in his mountains<br>Of hail & ice; voices of terror,<br>Are heard, like thunders of autumn,<br>When the cloud blazes over the harvests</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Chap: II</div><div style="margin:10px 0">1. Earth was not: nor globes of attraction<br>The will of the Immortal expanded<br>Or contracted his all flexible senses.<br>Death was not, but eternal life sprung</div><div style="margin:10px 0">2. The sound of a trumpet the heavens<br>Awoke & vast clouds of blood roll'd<br>Round the dim rocks of Urizen, so nam'd<br>That solitary one in Immensity</div><div style="margin:10px 0">3. Shrill the trumpet: & myriads of Eternity,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Muster around the bleak desarts<br>Now fill'd with clouds, darkness & waters<br>That roll'd perplex'd labring & utter'd<br>Words articulate, bursting in thunders<br>That roll'd on the tops of his mountains</div><div style="margin:10px 0">4: From the depths of dark solitude. From<br>The eternal abode in my holiness,<br>Hidden set apart in my stern counsels<br>Reserv'd for the days of futurity,<br>I have sought for a joy without pain,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">For a solid without fluctuation<br>Why will you die O Eternals?<br>Why live in unquenchable burnings?</div><div style="margin:10px 0">5 First I fought with the fire; consum'd<br>Inwards, into a deep world within:<br>A void immense, wild dark & deep,<br>Where nothing was: Natures wide womb</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And self balanc'd stretch'd o'er the void<br>I alone, even I! the winds merciless<br>Bound; but condensing, in torrents<br>They fall & fall; strong I repell'd<br>The vast waves, & arose on the waters<br>A wide world of solid obstruction</div><div style="margin:10px 0">6. Here alone I in books formd of metals<br>Have written the secrets of wisdom<br>The secrets of dark contemplation<br>By fightings and conflicts dire,<br>With terrible monsters Sin-bred:<br>Which the bosoms of all inhabit;<br>Seven deadly Sins of the soul.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">7. Lo! I unfold my darkness: and on<br>This rock, place with strong hand the Book<br>Of eternal brass, written in my solitude.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">8. Laws of peace, of love, of unity:<br>Of pity, compassion, forgiveness.<br>Let each chuse one habitation:<br>His ancient infinite mansion:<br>One command, one joy one desire,<br>One curse, one weight, one measure<br>One King, one God, one Law.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Chap: III</div><div style="margin:10px 0">1. The voice ended, they saw his pale visage<br>Emerge from the darkness; his hand<br>On the rock of eternity unclasping<br>The Book of brass. Rage siez'd the strong</div><div style="margin:10px 0">2. Rage, fury, intense indignation<br>In cataracts of fire blood & gall<br>In whirlwinds of sulphurous smoke:<br>And enormous forms of energy;<br>All the seven deadly sins of the soul</div><div style="margin:10px 0">In living creations appear'd<br>In the flames of eternal fury.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">3. Sund'ring, dark'ning, thund'ring!<br>Rent away with a terrible crash<br>Eternity roll'd wide apart</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Wide asunder rolling<br>Mountainous all around<br>Departing; departing; departing:<br>Leaving ruinous fragments of life<br>Hanging frowning cliffs & all between<br>An ocean of voidness unfathomable.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">4. The roaring fires ran o'er the heav'ns<br>In whirlwinds & cataracts of blood<br>And o'er the dark desarts of Urizen<br>Fires pour thro' the void on all sides<br>On Urizens self-begotten armies.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">5. But no light from the fires. all was darkness<br>In the flames of Eternal fury</div><div style="margin:10px 0">6. In fierce anguish & quenchless flames<br>To the desarts and rocks He ran raging<br>To hide, but He could not: combining<br>He dug mountains & hills in vast strength,<br>He piled them in incessant labour,<br>In howlings & pangs & fierce madness<br>Long periods in burning fires labouring<br>Till hoary, and age-broke, and aged,<br>In despair and the shadows of death.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">7. And a roof, vast petrific around,<br> On all sides He fram'd: like a womb;<br>Where thousands of rivers in veins<br>Of blood pour down the mountains to cool<br>The eternal fires beating without<br>From Eternals; & like a black globe<br>View'd by sons of Eternity, standing<br>On the shore of the infinite ocean<br>Like a human heart strugling & beating<br>The vast world of Urizen appear'd.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">8. And Los round the dark globe of Urizen,<br>Kept watch for Eternals to confine,<br>The obscure separation alone;<br>For Eternity stood wide apart,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">As the stars are apart from the earth</div><div style="margin:10px 0">9. Los wept howling around the dark Demon:<br>And cursing his lot; for in anguish,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Urizen was rent from his side;<br>And a fathomless void for his feet;<br>And intense fires for his dwelling.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">10. But Urizen laid in a stony sleep<br>Unorganiz'd, rent from Eternity</div><div style="margin:10px 0">11. The Eternals said: What is this? Death<br>Urizen is a clod of clay.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">12: Los howld in a dismal stupor,<br>Groaning! gnashing! groaning!<br>Till the wrenching apart was healed</div><div style="margin:10px 0">13: But the wrenching of Urizen heal'd not<br>Cold, featureless, flesh or clay,<br>Rifted with direful changes<br>He lay in a dreamless night</div><div style="margin:10px 0">14: Till Los rouz'd his fires, affrighted<br>At the formless unmeasurable death.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Chap: IV[a]</div><div style="margin:10px 0">1: Los smitten with astonishment<br>Frightend at the hurtling bones</div><div style="margin:10px 0">2: And at the surging sulphureous<br>Perturbed Immortal mad raging</div><div style="margin:10px 0">3: In whirlwinds & pitch & nitre<br>Round the furious limbs of Los</div><div style="margin:10px 0">4: And Los formed nets & gins<br>And threw the nets round about</div><div style="margin:10px 0">5: He watch'd in shuddring fear<br>The dark changes & bound every change<br>With rivets of iron & brass;</div><div style="margin:10px 0">6. And these were the changes of Urizen.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Chap: IV[b]</div><div style="margin:10px 0">1. Ages on ages roll'd over him!<br>In stony sleep ages roll'd over him!<br>Like a dark waste stretching chang'able<br>By earthquakes riv'n, belching sullen fires<br>On ages roll'd ages in ghastly</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Sick torment; around him in whirlwinds<br>Of darkness the eternal Prophet howl'd<br>Beating still on his rivets of iron<br>Pouring sodor of iron; dividing<br>The horrible night into watches.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">2. And Urizen (so his eternal name)<br>His prolific delight obscurd more & more<br>In dark secresy hiding in surgeing<br>Sulphureous fluid his phantasies.<br>The Eternal Prophet heavd the dark bellows,<br>And turn'd restless the tongs; and the hammer<br>Incessant beat; forging chains new & new<br>Numb'ring with links. hours, days & years</div><div style="margin:10px 0">3. The eternal mind bounded began to roll<br>Eddies of wrath ceaseless round & round,<br>And the sulphureous foam surgeing thick<br>Settled, a lake, bright, & shining clear:<br>White as the snow on the mountains cold.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">4. Forgetfulness, dumbness, necessity!<br>In chains of the mind locked up,<br>Like fetters of ice shrinking together<br>Disorganiz'd, rent from Eternity,<br>Los beat on his fetters of iron;<br>And heated his furnaces & pour'd<br>Iron sodor and sodor of brass</div><div style="margin:10px 0">5. Restless turnd the immortal inchain'd<br>Heaving dolorous! anguish'd! unbearable<br>Till a roof shaggy wild inclos'd<br>In an orb, his fountain of thought.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">6. In a horrible dreamful slumber;<br>Like the linked infernal chain;<br>A vast Spine writh'd in torment<br>Upon the winds; shooting pain'd<br>Ribs, like a bending cavern<br>And bones of solidness, froze<br>Over all his nerves of joy.<br>And a first Age passed over,<br>And a state of dismal woe.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">7. From the caverns of his jointed Spine,<br>Down sunk with fright a red<br>Round globe hot burning deep<br>Deep down into the Abyss:</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Panting: Conglobing, Trembling<br>Shooting out ten thousand branches<br>Around his solid bones.<br>And a second Age passed over,<br>And a state of dismal woe.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">8. In harrowing fear rolling round;<br>His nervous brain shot branches<br>Round the branches of his heart.<br>On high into two little orbs<br>And fixed in two little caves<br>Hiding carefully from the wind,<br>His Eyes beheld the deep,<br>And a third Age passed over:<br>And a state of dismal woe.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">9. The pangs of hope began,<br>In heavy pain striving, struggling.<br>Two Ears in close volutions.<br>From beneath his orbs of vision<br>Shot spiring out and petrified<br>As they grew. And a fourth Age passed<br>And a state of dismal woe.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">10. In ghastly torment sick;<br>Hanging upon the wind;</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Two Nostrils bent down to the deep.<br>And a fifth Age passed over;<br>And a state of dismal woe.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">11. In ghastly torment sick;<br>Within his ribs bloated round,<br>A craving Hungry Cavern;<br>Thence arose his channeld Throat,<br>And like a red flame a Tongue<br>Of thirst & of hunger appeard.<br>And a sixth Age passed over:<br>And a state of dismal woe.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">12. Enraged & stifled with torment<br>He threw his right Arm to the north<br>His left Arm to the south<br>Shooting out in anguish deep,<br>And his Feet stampd the nether Abyss<br>In trembling & howling & dismay.<br>And a seventh Age passed over:<br>And a state of dismal woe.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Chap: V</div><div style="margin:10px 0">I. In terrors Los shrunk from his task:<br>His great hammer fell from his hand:<br>His fires beheld, and sickening,<br>Hid their strong limbs in smoke.<br>For with noises ruinous loud;<br>With hurtlings & clashings & groans<br>The Immortal endur'd his chains,<br>Tho' bound in a deadly sleep.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"> 2. All the myriads of Eternity:<br>All the wisdom & joy of life:<br>Roll like a sea around him,<br>Except what his little orbs<br>Of sight by degrees unfold.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">3. And now his eternal life<br>Like a dream was obliterated</div><div style="margin:10px 0">4. Shudd'ring, the Eternal Prophet smote<br>With a stroke, from his north to south region<br>The bellows & hammer are silent now<br>A nerveless silence, his prophetic voice<br>Siez'd; a cold solitude & dark void<br>The Eternal Prophet & Urizen clos'd</div><div style="margin:10px 0">5. Ages on ages rolld over them<br>Cut off from life & light frozen<br>Into horrible forms of deformity<br>Los suffer'd his fires to decay<br>Then he look'd back with anxious desire<br>But the space undivided by existence<br>Struck horror into his soul.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">6. Los wept obscur'd with mourning:<br>His bosom earthquak'd with sighs;<br>He saw Urizen deadly black,<br>In his chains bound, & Pity began,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">7. In anguish dividing & dividing<br>For pity divides the soul<br>In pangs eternity on eternity<br>Life in cataracts pourd down his cliffs<br>The void shrunk the lymph into Nerves<br>Wand'ring wide on the bosom of night<br>And left a round globe of blood<br>Trembling upon the Void</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Thus the Eternal Prophet was divided<br>Before the death-image of Urizen<br>For in changeable clouds and darkness<br>In a winterly night beneath,<br>The Abyss of Los stretch'd immense:<br>And now seen, now obscur'd, to the eyes<br>Of Eternals, the visions remote<br>Of the dark seperation appear'd.<br>As glasses discover Worlds<br>In the endless Abyss of space,<br>So the expanding eyes of Immortals<br>Beheld the dark visions of Los,<br>And the globe of life blood trembling.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">8. The globe of life blood trembled<br>Branching out into roots;<br>Fib'rous, writhing upon the winds;<br>Fibres of blood, milk and tears;<br>In pangs, eternity on eternity.<br>At length in tears & cries imbodied<br>A female form trembling and pale<br>Waves before his deathy face</div><div style="margin:10px 0">9. All Eternity shudderd at sight<br>Of the first female now separate<br>Pale as a cloud of snow<br>Waving before the face of Los</div><div style="margin:10px 0">10. Wonder, awe, fear, astonishment,<br>Petrify the eternal myriads;<br>At the first female form now separate</div><div style="margin:10px 0">11. "Spread a Tent, with strong curtains around them<br>"Let cords & stakes bind in the Void<br>That Eternals may no more behold them"<br> <br>12. They began to weave curtains of darkness<br>They erected large pillars round the Void<br>With golden hooks fastend in the pillars<br>With infinite labour the Eternals<br>A woof wove, and called it Science</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Chap: VI</div><div style="margin:10px 0">1. But Los saw the Female & pitied<br>He embrac'd her, she wept, she refus'd<br>In perverse and cruel delight<br>She fled from his arms, yet he followd</div><div style="margin:10px 0">2. Eternity shudder'd when they saw,<br>Man begetting his likeness,<br>On his own divided image.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">3. A time passed over, the Eternals<br>Began to erect the tent;<br>When Enitharmon sick,<br>Felt a Worm within her womb.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">4. Yet helpless it lay like a Worm<br>In the trembling womb<br>To be moulded into existence<br> <br>5. All day the worm lay on her bosom<br>All night within her womb<br>The worm lay till it grew to a serpent<br>With dolorous hissings & poisons<br>Round Enitharmons loins folding,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">6. Coild within Enitharmons womb<br>The serpent grew casting its scales,<br>With sharp pangs the hissings began<br>To change to a grating cry,<br>Many sorrows and dismal throes,<br>Many forms of fish, bird & beast,<br>Brought forth an Infant form<br>Where was a worm before.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">7. The Eternals their tent finished<br>Alarm'd with these gloomy visions<br>When Enitharmon groaning<br>Produc'd a man Child to the light.<br> <br>8. A shriek ran thro' Eternity:<br>And a paralytic stroke;<br>At the birth of the Human shadow.<br> <br>9. Delving earth in his resistless way;<br>Howling, the Child with fierce flames<br>Issu'd from Enitharmon.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">10. The Eternals, closed the tent<br>They beat down the stakes the cords</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Stretch'd for a work of eternity;<br>No more Los beheld Eternity.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">11. In his hands he siez'd the infant<br>He bathed him in springs of sorrow<br>He gave him to Enitharmon.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Chap: VII</div><div style="margin:10px 0"> 1. They named the child Orc, he grew<br>Fed with milk of Enitharmon</div><div style="margin:10px 0">2. Los awoke her; O sorrow & pain!<br>A tight'ning girdle grew,<br>Around his bosom. In sobbings<br>He burst the girdle in twain,<br>But still another girdle<br>Opressd his bosom, In sobbings<br>Again he burst it. Again<br>Another girdle succeeds<br>The girdle was form'd by day;<br>By night was burst in twain.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">3. These falling down on the rock<br>Into an iron Chain<br>In each other link by link lock'd</div><div style="margin:10px 0">4. They took Orc to the top of a mountain.<br>O how Enitharmon wept!<br>They chain'd his young limbs to the rock<br>With the Chain of Jealousy<br>Beneath Urizens deathful shadow</div><div style="margin:10px 0">5. The dead heard the voice of the child<br>And began to awake from sleep<br>All things. heard the voice of the child<br>And began to awake to life.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">6. And Urizen craving with hunger<br>Stung with the odours of Nature<br>Explor'd his dens around</div><div style="margin:10px 0">7. He form'd a line & a plummet<br>To divide the Abyss beneath.<br>He form'd a dividing rule:<br> <br>8. He formed scales to weigh;<br>He formed massy weights;<br>He formed a brazen quadrant;</div><div style="margin:10px 0">He formed golden compasses<br>And began to explore the Abyss<br>And he planted a garden of fruits</div><div style="margin:10px 0"> 9. But Los encircled Enitharmon<br>With fires of Prophecy<br>From the sight of Urizen & Orc.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">10. And she bore an enormous race</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Chap: VIII</div><div style="margin:10px 0">1. Urizen explor'd his dens<br>Mountain, moor, & wilderness,<br>With a globe of fire lighting his journey<br>A fearful journey, annoy'd<br>By cruel enormities: forms</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Of life on his forsaken mountains</div><div style="margin:10px 0">2. And his world teemd vast enormities<br>Frightning; faithless; fawning<br>Portions of life; similitudes<br>Of a foot, or a hand, or a head<br>Or a heart, or an eye, they swam mischevous<br>Dread terrors! delighting in blood<br> <br>3. Most Urizen sicken'd to see<br>His eternal creations appear<br>Sons & daughters of sorrow on mountains<br>Weeping! wailing! first Thiriel appear'd<br>Astonish'd at his own existence<br>Like a man from a cloud born, & Utha<br>From the waters emerging, laments!<br>Grodna rent the deep earth howling<br>Amaz'd! his heavens immense cracks<br>Like the ground parch'd with heat; then Fuzon<br>Flam'd out! first begotten, last born.<br>All his eternal sons in like manner<br>His daughters from green herbs & cattle<br>From monsters, & worms of the pit.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">4. He in darkness clos'd, view'd all his race,<br>And his soul sicken'd! he curs'd<br>Both sons & daughters; for he saw<br>That no flesh nor spirit could keep<br>His iron laws one moment.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">5. For he saw that life liv'd upon death</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The Ox in the slaughter house moans<br>The Dog at the wintry door<br>And he wept, & he called it Pity<br>And his tears flowed down on the winds</div><div style="margin:10px 0">6. Cold he wander'd on high, over their cities<br>In weeping & pain & woe!<br>And where-ever he wanderd in sorrows<br>Upon the aged heavens<br>A cold shadow follow'd behind him<br>Like a spiders web, moist, cold, & dim<br>Drawing out from his sorrowing soul<br>The dungeon-like heaven dividing.<br>Where ever the footsteps of Urizen<br>Walk'd over the cities in sorrow.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">7. Till a Web dark & cold, throughout all<br>The tormented element stretch'd<br>From the sorrows of Urizens soul<br>And the Web is a Female in embrio<br>None could break the Web, no wings of fire.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">8. So twisted the cords, & so knotted<br>The meshes: twisted like to the human brain</div><div style="margin:10px 0">9. And all calld it, The Net of Religion</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Chap: IX</div><div style="margin:10px 0">1. Then the Inhabitants of those Cities:<br>Felt their Nerves change into Marrow<br>And hardening Bones began<br>In swift diseases and torments,<br>In throbbings & shootings & grindings<br>Thro' all the coasts; till weaken'd<br>The Senses inward rush'd shrinking,<br>Beneath the dark net of infection.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">2. Till the shrunken eyes clouded over<br>BDiscernd not the woven hipocrisy<br>But the streaky slime in their heavens<br>Brought together by narrowing perceptions<br>Appeard transparent air; for their eyes<br>Grew small like the eyes of a man<br>And in reptile forms shrinking together<br>Of seven feet stature they remaind</div><div style="margin:10px 0">3. Six days they shrunk up from existence<br>And on the seventh day they rested<br>And they bless'd the seventh day, in sick hope:<br>And forgot their eternal life</div><div style="margin:10px 0">4. And their thirty cities divided<br>In form of a human heart<br>No more could they rise at will<br>In the infinite void, but bound down<br>To earth by their narrowing perceptions</div><div style="margin:10px 0">They lived a period of years<br>Then left a noisom body<br>To the jaws of devouring darkness</div><div style="margin:10px 0">5. And their children wept, & built<br>Tombs in the desolate places,<br>And form'd laws of prudence, and call'd them<br>The eternal laws of God</div><div style="margin:10px 0">6. And the thirty cities remaind<br>Surrounded by salt floods, now call'd<br>Africa: its name was then Egypt.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">7. The remaining sons of Urizen<br>Beheld their brethren shrink together<br>Beneath the Net of Urizen;<br>Perswasion was in vain;<br>For the ears of the inhabitants,<br>Were wither'd, & deafen'd, & cold:<br>And their eyes could not discern,<br>Their brethren of other cities.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">8. So Fuzon call'd all together<br>The remaining children of Urizen:<br>And they left the pendulous earth:<br>They called it Egypt, & left it.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">9. And the salt ocean rolled englob'd</div><div style="margin:10px 0"> The End of the [first] book of Urizen</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=William+Blake">William Blake</a><div class=q> <img src="https://www.citatepedia.ro/g/32share.png" style="float:left" alt="Share"> <script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=38306" data-title="The Book of Urizen de William Blake" data-description="PRELUDIUM TO THE [FIRST] BOOK OF URIZEN/Of the primeval Priests assum'd power,/When Eternals spurn'd back his religion;/And gave him a place in the north,/Obscure, shadowy, void, solitary./Eternals I hear your call gladly,/Dictate swift winged wor..."></div> </div> </div>

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