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Inscribed in orange ink, upper right: "17"

Lettered inside image: "His Spectre divides & Los in fury compells it to divide: | To labour in the fire, in the water, in the earth, in the air, | To follow the Daughters of Albion as the hound follows the scent | Of the wild inhabitant of the forest, to drive them from his own : | To make a way for the Children of Los to come from the Furnaces. | But Los himself against Albion's Sons his fury bends, for he | Dare not approach the Daughters openly lest he be consumed | In the fires of their beauty & perfection & be Vegetated beneath | Their Looms, in a Generation of death & resurrection to forgetfulness. | They woo Los continually to subdue his strength: he continually Shews them his Spectre; sending him abroad over the four points of heaven | In the fierce desires of beauty & in the tortures of repulse : He is | The Spectre of the Living pursuing the Emanations of the Dead. | Shudd'ring they flee: they hide in the Druid Temples in cold chastity: | Subdued by the Spectre of the Living & terrified by undisguis'd desire. | For Los said : Tho' my Spectre is divided, as I am a Living Man | I must compell him to obey me wholly: that Enitharmon may not | Be lost, & lest he should devour Enitharmon: Ah me! | Piteous image of my soft desires & loves: O Enitharmon! | I will compell my Spectre to obey: I will restore to thee thy Children. | No one bruises or starves himself to make himself fit for labour! | Tormented with sweet desire for these beauties of Albion, | They would never love my power if they did not seek to destroy | Enitharmon: Vala would never have sought & loved Albion | If she had not sought to destroy Jerusalem: such is that false | And Generating Love: a pretence of love to destroy love: | Cruel hipocrisy unlike the lovely delusions of Beulah: | And cruel forms, unlike the merciful forms of Beulah's Night. | They know not why they love nor wherefore they sicken & die, | Calling that Holy Love, which is Envy Revenge & Cruelty, | Which separated the stars from the mountains: the mountains from Man, | And left Man, a little grovelling Root, outside of Himself. | Negations are not Contraries: Contraries mutually Exist: | But Negations Exist Not: Exceptions & Objections & Unbeliefs | Exist not: nor shall they ever be Organized for ever & ever. | If thou separate from me, thou art a Negation: a meer | Reasoning & Derogation from me, an Objecting & cruel Spite | And Malice & Envy: but my Emanation, Alas! will become | My Contrary. O thou Negation, I will continually compell | Thee to be invisible to any but whom I please, & when | And where & how I please, and never! never! shalt thou be Organized, | But as a distorted & reversed Reflexion in the Darkness | And in the Non Entity: nor shall that which is above | Ever descend into thee : but thou shalt be a Non Entity for ever. | And if any enter into thee, thou shalt be an Unquenchable Fire | And he shall be a never dying Worm, mutually tormented by | Those that thou tormentest, a Hell & Despair for ever & ever. | So Los in secret with himself communed & Enitharmon heard | In her darkness & was comforted : yet still she divided away | In gnawing pain from Los's bosom in the deadly Night; | First as a red Globe of blood trembling beneath his bosom | Suspended over her he hung : he infolded her in his garments | Of wool : he hid her from the Spectre, in shame & confusion of | Face; in terrors & pains of Hell & Eternal Death, the | Trembling Globe shot forth Self-living & Los howl'd over it: | Feeding it with his groans & tears day & night without ceasing: | And the Spectrous Darkness from his back divided in temptations, | And in grinding agonies, in threats, stiflings, & direful strugglings. | Go thou to Skofield : ask him if he is Bath or if he is Canterbury. | Tell him to be no more dubious: demand explicit words. | Tell him: I will dash him into shivers, where & at what time | I please: tell Hand & Skofield they are my ministers of evil | To those I hate: for I can hate also as well as they!"