<< YCBA Home Yale Center for British Art Yale Center for British Art << YCBA Home

YCBA Collections Search

 
IIIF Actions
Creator:
Print made by William Blake, 1757–1827
Title:
"The Four Zoa's clouded rage..." (Plate 74)
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 6 1/2 inches (22.6 x 16.5 cm)
Inscription(s)/Marks/Lettering:

Inscribed in orange ink, upper right: "74"

Lettered inside image: "The Four Zoas clouded rage; Urizen stood by Albion, | With Rintrah and Palamabron and Theotormon and Bromion: | These Four are Verulam & London & York & Edinburgh : | And the Four Zoas are Urizen & Luvah & Tharmas & Urthona, | In opposition deadly, and their Wheels in poisonous | And deadly stupor turn'd against each other loud & fierce. | Entering into the Reasoning Power, forsaking Imagination, | They became Spectres: & their Human Bodies were reposed | In Beulah, by the Daughters of Beulah, with tears & lamentations. | The Spectre is the Reasoning Power in Man; & when separated | From Imagination, and closing itself as in steel, in a Ratio | Of the Things of Memory, It thence frames Laws & Moralities | To destroy Imagination, the Divine Body, by Martyrdoms & Wars. | Teach me, O Holy Spirit, the Testimony of Jesus! let me | Comprehend wonderous things out of the Divine Law. | I behold Babylon in the opening Streets of London, I behold | Jerusalem in ruins wandering about from house to house. | This I behold: the shudderings of death attend my steps. | I walk up and down in Six Thousand Years: their Events are present before me, | To tell how Los in grief & anger, whirling round his Hammer on high, | Drave the Sons & Daughters of Albion from their ancient mountains: | They became the Twelve Gods of Asia Opposing the Divine Vision. | The Sons of Albion are Twelve : the Sons of Jerusalem Sixteen. | I tell how Albion's Sons by Harmonies of Concords & Discords, | Opposed to Melody, and by Lights & Shades, opposed to Outline, | And by Abstraction, opposed to the Visions of Imagination, | By cruel Laws divided Sixteen into Twelve Divisions: | How Hyle roof'd Los in Albion's Cliffs, by the Affections rent | Asunder & opposed to Thought, to draw Jerusalem's Sons | Into the Vortex of his Wheels, therefore Hyle is called Gog, | Age after age drawing them away towards Babylon, | Babylon, the Rational Morality deluding to death the little ones | In strong temptations of stolen beauty : I tell how Reuben slept | On London Stone & the Daughters of Albion ran around admiring | His awful beauty: with Moral Virtue the fair deciever, offspring | Of Good & Evil, they divided him in love upon the Thames & sent | Him over Europe in streams of gore out of Cathedron's Looms. | How Los drave them from Albion & they became Daughters of Canaan, | Hence Albion was call'd the Canaanite & all his Giant Sons. | Hence is my Theme. O Lord my Saviour, open thou the Gates | And I will lead forth thy Words, telling how the Daughters | Cut the Fibres of Reuben, how he roll'd apart & took Root | In Bashan, terror-struck Albion's Sons look toward Bashan. | They have divided Simeon: he also roll'd apart in blood | Over the Nations, till he took Root beneath the shining Looms | Of Albion's Daughters in Philistea by the side of Amalek. | They have divided Levi: he hath shot out into Forty eight Roots | Over the Land of Canaan: they have divided Judah: | He hath took Root in Hebron, in the Land of Hand & Hyle. | Dan: Napthali: Gad: Asher: Issachar: Zebulun: roll apart | From all the Nations of the Earth to dissipate into Non Entity. | I see a Feminine Form arise from the Four terrible Zoas, | Beautiful but terrible, struggling to take a form of beauty, | Rooted in Shechem: this is Dinah, the youthful form of Erin. | The Wound I see in South Molton Street & Stratford place, | Whence Joseph & Benjamin roll'd apart away from the Nations: | In vain they roll'd apart: they are fix'd into the Land of Cabul."

Credit Line:
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection
Copyright Status:
Public Domain
Accession Number:
B1992.8.1(74)
Classification:
Prints
Collection:
Prints and Drawings
Subject Terms:
branches | clouds | literary theme | nudes | religious and mythological subject | roots | text | vines | wings | women
Access:
Accessible in the Study Room [Request]
Link:
https://collections.britishart.yale.edu/catalog/tms:3508
Export:
XML
IIIF Manifest:
JSON

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]

Denise Gigante, Life, organic form and Romanticism , Yale University Press, New Haven, 2009, between p. 114 and 115, p. 120, Pl. III.3, PR575.L54 G54 2009 (YCBA) [YCBA]


If you have information about this object that may be of assistance please contact us.