English poet & painter (1757-1827)
Degrade first the arts if you'd mankind degrade,
Hire idiots to paint with cold light and hot shade.
WILLIAM BLAKE
Annotations to Sir Joshua Reynolds's Discourses
Cruelty has a human heart,
And Jealousy a human face;
Terror the human form divine,
And Secrecy the human dress.
WILLIAM BLAKE
"A Divine Image", Songs of Experience
Cherish pity, lest you drive an angel from ye door.
WILLIAM BLAKE
"Holy Thursday"
Can I see another's woe,
And not be in sorrow too?
Can I see another's grief,
And not seek for kind relief?
WILLIAM BLAKE
"The Divine Image", Songs of Innocence
It is not because angels are holier than men or devils that makes them angels, but because they do not expect holiness from one another, but from God only.
WILLIAM BLAKE
A Vision of the Last Judgment
I have Conquer'd, and shall still Go on Conquering. Nothing can withstand the fury of my Course.
WILLIAM BLAKE
The Letters of William Blake
Little Lamb, who made thee?
Dost thou know who made thee?
Gave thee life and bid thee feed
By the stream and o'er the mead;
Gave thee clothing of delight,
Softest clothing, woolly bright.
WILLIAM BLAKE
"The Lamb", Songs of Innocence
A robin redbreast in a cage
Puts all Heaven in a rage.
WILLIAM BLAKE
Auguries of Innocence
Terror in the house does roar,
But Pity stands before the door.
WILLIAM BLAKE
"Terror in the House"
Bit from the dolorous groan on high a shadow of smoke appeared,
And human bones rattling together in the smoke and stamping
The nether abyss, and gnashing in fierce despair, and panting in sobs,
Thick, short, incessant, bursting, sobbing, deep despairing, stamping,
Struggling to utter the voice of man, to take features of man,
To take the limbs of man.
WILLIAM BLAKE
Vala
Are those who love like those who died, risen again from death,
Immortal in immortal torment never to be delivered?
WILLIAM BLAKE
Vala
Where lambs have nibbled, silent moves
The feet of angels bright;
Unseen they pour blessing,
And joy without ceasing,
On each bud and blossom,
And each sleeping bosom.
WILLIAM BLAKE
Night
The true method of knowledge is experiment.
WILLIAM BLAKE
All Religions are One
Pity must join together those whom wrath has torn in sunder.
WILLIAM BLAKE
Jerusalem: The Emanation of the Giant Albion
For a tear is an intellectual thing,
And a sigh is the sword of an Angel King,
And the bitter groan of the martyr's woe
Is an arrow from the Almighty's bow.
WILLIAM BLAKE
"The Gray Monk", Poems from the Pickering Manuscript
He who shall teach the child to doubt
The rotting grave shall ne'er get out.
WILLIAM BLAKE
Auguries of Innocence
You never know what is enough unless you know what is more than enough.
WILLIAM BLAKE
Proverbs of Hell
God appears and god is light
To those poor souls who dwell in night
But does a human form display
To those who dwell in realms of day.
WILLIAM BLAKE
Auguries of Innocence
A dog starved at his master's gate
Predicts the ruin of the state.
WILLIAM BLAKE
Auguries of Innocence
Everything possible to be believ'd is an image of truth.
WILLIAM BLAKE
"Proverbs of Hell", The Marriage of Heaven and Hell