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Jerusalem, the confusion is even greater. The book seems to retell the same story of man's fall and regeneration, symbolised this time by the conflicts of Los and the sons of Albion. Jerusalem moves among them, a lost and wandering spirit. It is almost impossible to say, at any given point in the story, where the characters are meant to be, or what it is that they desire: and when, after a long and patient reading, one has come to the end of the book, it is still more impossible to give any connected summary of its incidents. One can only carry away a recollection of detached fragments, and a painful impression of having been hurled from one episode to another. The Milton, being shorter, is easier to follow. But here also, in many passages, it is very difficult to see the drift of the poet's thought. We read, all the time, without knowing whither we are being led.

It could not be otherwise, with such a method of writing as Blake's. When he had finished a page, or, rather, when he had written it at the dictation of his celestial visitants, he set it aside and thought no more about it. Except in the case of the early collections of poemsthe Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience-we have very few instances of his ever having re-read or corrected any of his works. All his principles were opposed to such a course." The crooked roads without Improvement, are roads of Genius." So great was his respect for inspiration that he thought he had no right to change a single word, once it was written. Similarly, he regarded himself as having no authority to suppress any inspired thought; so that everything had to have a place in his work found for it by some means or other. This explains why so many passages in the Prophetic Books are excrescences, and ought not to be there at all, why others again are out of their proper places, and why the reader continually has the sensation of leaping from one subject to another. And it is on this account also that we find pages of one book reproduced, almost word for word, in another; parts of Urizen, for instance, recurring in Vala, and parts of Vala in Jerusalem or America. Incoherencies, repetitions, breaks in the continuity of the narrative-all these would be quite enough, even if the language were clear and simple, to render much of Blake's work incomprehensible at first sight. One would have, in order to make it readable, to go through it and prune it unmercifully, cutting out a good half; and then, if possible, to reduce the remaining half to logical order. This, however, would be a Herculean task. Messrs. Ellis and Yeats have expended an immense 1 Marriage of Heaven and Hell, p. 10.

amount of labour upon the arrangement of the sheets of Vala, left by Blake in disorder; and, thanks to them, we can read this book with more intellectual enjoyment than if Blake had settled the order of the pages himself. And still the mind is far from being satisfied. As to the pages of Jerusalem, which Blake first classified, then disarranged, and finally added to before publication, one can but think that they also stand in need of similar readjustment. But where is the editor who would venture upon so vast an undertaking? Better, surely, to leave these works as they stand, with all their disordered strength of imagination, and to read them simply as collections of isolated but richly suggestive fragments, united only by a common bond of thought and inspiration. Regarding them thus, we shall find their faults of composition diminish till they all but disappear, while the genius of the poet and the splendour of the artist's visions are shown in a light which will enable us to appreciate them more completely.

B

XV: SYMBOLISM IN LANGUAGE

LAKE'S symbolic language is perhaps even more largely responsible than his want of logic for the obscurity of his writings. His use of this symbolic language was a natural result of his views upon the nature of the world and upon art. To him, the spiritual world revealed itself not in abstract terms, but in concrete symbols, which were the visible things of this world. He saw the supernatural, instead of merely imagining it. The living spirit was symbolised and made visible to men by lifeless matter. The created world was an expression of the Divine Humanity in all its forms.

But the artist's creation should be an analogous kind of expression. His abstract ideas ought only to be represented by words which designate concrete things. A thought can only be expressed by a symbol. The artist must therefore create a symbol for every thought, and must speak always in metaphors. He will learn to live in the symbolic world created by his own mind, as we live in the midst of that vast, composite symbol which is the universe. And just as we see concrete objects without thinking of the metaphysical ideas they represent, so Blake, having created his symbols, proceeds to use them as living personages without regarding the idea that underlay them and had brought them into existence. He comes to feel, think and speak in symbols. Urizen and Los cease to be allegorical figures, and become actual persons, like Hamlet or Polonius, like Milton or Blake himself. This process takes place in the mind of every poet, but Blake carried it further than all the others.

His symbolism is not a mere employment of allegorical or metaphorical language, the meaning of which is generally quite easy to discover. When Blake is content to use it, his poetry is perfectly clear. One can easily interpret such lines as

Think in the morning, Act in the noon, Eat in the evening, Sleep in the night. 1

It is an easy thing.

To hear the dog howl at the wintry door, the ox in the slaughter-house

2

moan.

1 Marriage of Heaven and Hell, p. 9.

2 Vala. Night II, 400.

No greater difficulty is presented by little allegories like

The modest Rose puts forth a thorn,

The humble Sheep a threat'ning horn;
While the Lilly white shall in Love delight,
Nor a thorn, nor a threat, stain her beauty bright. 1

A little practice will soon teach us to translate

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 ? ?

by: "The depths of knowledge and feeling are revealed to the simplest and most modest creatures," or, in the words of the Evangelist, "Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes." 3

Similarly, when we read of cold snows gathering round Urizen's loins, we can interpret it as meaning that Reason devoid of Faith has lost its creative power; while " The Guardian Prince of Albion burns in his nightly tent," can be rendered as "There still remains in the darkened soul of man an instinct which reminds him of his eternal origin."

Such metaphors as these are to some extent comprehensible because there is a visible analogy between the concrete thing and the abstract idea represented by it. But this is not always the case with symbols. When the Early Christians represented Christ as the Good Shepherd, there was no difficulty in understanding what was meant by the symbol. But when they represented Him by a fish, because of the letters forming His name, they created a new symbol, which only the initiate could understand or guess at, and which was no longer a metaphor, but a conventional sign. A symbol, therefore, may have either an allegorical or a conventional origin, though it may not be always possible to distinguish between the two. From one or other of them, however, spring all the different kinds of symbolical language, from the poet's similes to the popular "Language of Flowers." There is no need here to show how, in the case of certain symbols, the original allegory has been forgotten, and how, in other cases, the convention can be traced to some known historical source. It is enough to point out that in Blake the two kinds of symbols are 1 Songs of Experience: The Lilly. 2 Book of Thel: Thel's Motto. 3 St. Luke, x, 21.

America, p. 3, I.

constantly mingled, and to show how he created more and more symbols, in proportion as he found more ideas to express. Sometimes he uses quite common ones, such as the myrtle to symbolise marriage, or the serpent with its tail in its mouth to represent eternity: but he is generally rather sparing of these, and prefers symbols of his own invention. And here begins the difficulty.

To grasp the thought underlying his words, we must have eyes like his own, capable of reading his books as he read the world, with the faculty of double or triple vision. His symbolism becomes more and more complex as we go on. In the earlier poems, his language is generally comprehensible, and his metaphors are fairly clear. Often he even adds a few words of interpretation when necessary. For example :

I went to the Garden of Love,

And Priests in black gowns were walking their rounds,
And binding with briars my joys and desires.

1

Sometimes, however, the explanation he gives of a symbol is itself symbolic and obscure. Thus the allegory of the "Little Girl Lost" is explained by another allegory.

In futurity

I prophetic see

That the earth from sleep

Shall arise and seek

For her maker meek;

And the desart wild

Become a garden mild. 2

In the Prophetic Books, he disdains to use ordinary language; and the explanatory passages are few and brief. His allegories become more and more obscure. Many even of the shorter pieces, such as the Mental Traveller and the Crystal Cabinet, admit of various interpretations, all equally problematical. As for the long poems like America, the Song of Los and, above all, Vala, Jerusalem and Milton, they defy all commentators. Several laborious attempts at interpretation have been made, but even the makers have recognised that they fall far short of giving every shade of meaning. Sometimes, too, the interpretation

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