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Creator:
Print made by William Blake, 1757–1827
Title:
"Turning his back to the Divine Vision..." (Plate 33)
Part Of:

Collective Title: Jerusalem: The Emanation of The Giant Albion, Copy E

Date:
1804 to 1820
Materials & Techniques:
Relief etching printed in orange ink, with watercolor and pen and black ink on moderately thick, smooth, cream wove paper
Dimensions:
Sheet: 13 1/2 x 10 3/8 inches (34.3 x 26.4 cm), Plate: 8 7/8 x 5 7/8 inches (22.5 x 14.9 cm)
Inscription(s)/Marks/Lettering:

Inscribed in orange ink, upper right: "33"

Lettered inside image: "Turning his back to the Divine Vision, his Spectrous | Chaos before his face appear'd: an Unformed Memory! | Then spoke the Spectrous Chaos to Albion, dark'ning, cold, | From the back & loins where dwell the Spectrous Dead : | I am your Rational Power, O Albion, & that Human Form | You call Divine, is but a Worm seventy inches long | That creeps forth in a night & is dried in the morning sun, | In fortuitous concourse of memorys accumulated & lost. | It plows the Earth in its own conceit, it overwhelms the Hills | Beneath its winding labyrinths, till a stone of the brook | Stops it in midst of its pride among its hills & rivers. | Battersea & Chelsea mourn, London & Canterbury tremble, | Their place shall not be found as the wind passes over. | The ancient Cities of the Earth remove as a traveller, | And shall Albion's Cities remain when I pass over them, | With my deluge of forgotten remembrances over the tablet? | So spoke the Spectre to Albion, he is the Great Selfhood | Satan, Worship'd as God by the Mighty Ones of the Earth, | Having a white Dot call'd a Center from which branches out | A Circle in continual gyrations: this became a Heart | From which sprang numerous branches varying their motions, | Producing many Heads, three or seven or ten, & hands & feet, | Innumerable at will of the unfortunate contemplator | Who becomes his food: such is the way of the Devouring Power. | And this is the cause of the appearance in the frowning Chaos: | Albion's Emanation which he had hidden in Jealousy | Appear'd now in the frowning Chaos, prolific upon the Chaos, | Reflecting back to Albion in Sexual Reasoning, Hermaphroditic. | Albion spoke. Who art thou that appearest in gloomy pomp, | Involving the Divine Vision in colours of autumn ripeness? | I never saw thee till this time, nor beheld life abstracted | Nor darkness immingled with light on my furrow'd field. | Whence earnest thou? who art thou, O loveliest? the Divine Vision | Is as nothing before thee, faded is all life and joy. | Vala replied in clouds of tears Albion's garment embracing. | I was a City & a Temple built by Albion's Children! | I was a Garden planted with beauty, I allured on hill & valley | The River of Life to flow against my walls & among my trees. | Vala was Albion's Bride & Wife in great Eternity: | The loveliest of the daughters of Eternity, when in day-break | I emanated from Luvah over the Towers of Jerusalem, | And in her Courts among her little Children, offering up | The Sacrifice of fanatic love! why loved I Jerusalem? | Why was I one with her embracing in the Vision of Jesus? | Wherefore did I loving create love, which never yet | Immingled God & Man, when thou & I hid the Divine Vision | In cloud of secret gloom which behold involve me round about? | Know me now Albion: look upon me, I alone am Beauty: | The Imaginative Human Form is but a breathing of Vala: | I breathe him forth into the Heaven from my secret Cave, | Born of the Woman to obey the Woman, O Albion the mighty, | For the Divine appearance is Brotherhood, but I am Love"

Credit Line:
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection
Copyright Status:
Public Domain
Accession Number:
B1992.8.1(33)
Classification:
Prints
Collection:
Prints and Drawings
Subject Terms:
beard | field | harness | hills | lions | literary theme | men | oxen | plow, garden | religious and mythological subject | text
Access:
Accessible in the Study Room [Request]
Link:
https://collections.britishart.yale.edu/catalog/tms:3463
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William Blake (Tate Britain, 2000-11-02 - 2001-02-04) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

The Human Form Divine - William Blake from the Paul Mellon Collection (Yale Center for British Art, 1997-04-02 - 1997-07-06) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition] [Exhibition Description]


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