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Creator:
Print made by William Blake, 1757–1827
Title:
"Elevate into the Region of Brotherhood..." (Plate 34)
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 3/8 x 5 7/8 inches (21.2 x 15 cm)
Inscription(s)/Marks/Lettering:

Lettered inside image: "Elevate into the Region of Brotherhood with my red fires. | Art thou Vala? replied Albion, image of my repose! | O how I tremble! how my members pour down milky fear! | A dewy garment covers me all over, all manhood is gone! | At thy word & at thy look death enrobes me about | From head to feet, a garment of death & eternal fear. | Is not that Sun thy husband & that Moon thy glimmering Veil ? | Are not the Stars of heaven thy Children? art thou not Babylon? | Art thou Nature Mother of all ? is Jerusalem thy Daughter? | Why have thou elevate inward, O dweller of outward chambers, | From grot & cave beneath the Moon, dim region of death, | Where I laid my Plow in the hot noon, where my hot team fed, | Where implements of War are forged, the Plow to go over the Nations, | In pain girding me round like a rib of iron in heaven: O Vala! | In Eternity they neither marry nor are given in marriage. | Albion the high Cliff of the Atlantic is become a barren Land. | Los stood at his Anvil: he heard the contentions of Vala, | He heav'd his thund'ring Bellows upon the valleys of Middlesex, | He open'd his Furnaces before Vala; then Albion frown'd in anger | On his Rock, ere yet the Starry Heavens were fled away | From his awful Members; and thus Los cried aloud | To the Sons of Albion & to Hand the eldest Son of Albion. | I hear the screech of Childbirth loud pealing, & the groans | Of Death, in Albion's clouds dreadful utter 'd over all the Earth. | What may Man be? who can tell! but what may Woman be, | To have power over Man from Cradle to corruptible Grave ? | There is a Throne in every Man, it is the Throne of God, | This Woman has claim'd as her own & Man is no more! | Albion is the Tabernacle of Vala & her Temple, | And not the Tabernacle & Temple of the Most High. | O Albion why wilt thou Create a Female Will? | To hide the most evident God in a hidden covert, even | In the shadows of a Woman, & a secluded Holy Place, | That we may pry after him as after a stolen treasure, | Hidden among the Dead & mured up from the paths of life. | Hand! art thou not Reuben enrooting thyself into Bashan, | Till thou remainest a vaporous Shadow in a Void? O Merlin! | Unknown among the Dead where never before Existence came, | Is this the Female Will O ye lovely Daughters of Albion, To | Converse concerning Weight & Distance in the Wilds of Newton & Locke? | So Los spoke standing on Mam-Tor, looking over Europe & Asia: | The Graves thunder beneath his feet from Ireland to Japan. | Reuben slept in Bashan like one dead, in the Valley, | Cut off from Albion's mountains & from all the Earth's summits, | Between Succoth & Zaretan beside the Stone of Bohan ; | While the Daughters of Albion divided Luvah into three Bodies. | Los bended his Nostrils down to the Earth, then sent him over | Jordan to the Land of the Hittite; every-one that saw him | Fled! they fled at his horrible Form; they hid in caves | And dens, they looked on one-another & became what they beheld. | Reuben return'd to Bashan, in despair he slept on the Stone. | Then Gwendolen divided into Rahab & Tirza in Twelve Portions | Los rolled his Eyes into two narrow circles, then sent him | Over Jordan; all terrified fled; they became what they beheld. | If Perceptive Organs vary: Objects of Perception seem to vary: | If the Perceptive Organs close : their Objects seem to close also. | Consider this, O mortal Man: O worm of sixty winters, said Los, | Consider Sexual Organization & hide thee in the dust."

Credit Line:
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection
Copyright Status:
Public Domain
Accession Number:
B1992.8.1(34)
Classification:
Prints
Collection:
Prints and Drawings
Subject Terms:
literary theme | religious and mythological subject | roots | text | vegetation | vines
Access:
Accessible in the Study Room [Request]
Link:
https://collections.britishart.yale.edu/catalog/tms:3464
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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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