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William Blake Quotes
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William Blake was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age. What he called his prophetic works were said by 20th-century critic Northrop Frye to form "what is in proportion to its merits the least read body of poetry in the English language". His visual artistry led 21st-century critic Jonathan Jones to proclaim him "far and away the greatest artist Britain has ever produced". In 2002, Blake was placed at number 38 in the BBC's poll of the 100 Greatest Britons. While he lived in London his entire life, except for three years spent in Felpham, he produced a diverse and symbolically rich œuvre, which embraced the imagination as "the body of God" or "human existence itself".Although Blake was considered mad by contemporaries for his idiosyncratic views, he is held in high regard by later critics for his expressiveness and creativity, and for the philosophical and mystical undercurrents within his work. His paintings and poetry have been characterised as part of the Romantic movement and as "Pre-Romantic". A committed Christian who was hostile to the Church of England , Blake was influenced by the ideals and ambitions of the French and American Revolutions. Though later he rejected many of these political beliefs, he maintained an amiable relationship with the political activist Thomas Paine; he was also influenced by thinkers such as Emanuel Swedenborg. Despite these known influences, the singularity of Blake's work makes him difficult to classify. The 19th-century scholar William Michael Rossetti characterised him as a "glorious luminary", and "a man not forestalled by predecessors, nor to be classed with contemporaries, nor to be replaced by known or readily surmisable successors".



Wikipedia  

✵ 28. November 1757 – 12. August 1827   •   Other names 威廉布萊克, Williem Blake
William Blake photo
William Blake: 249   quotes 66   likes

William Blake Quotes

“Thinking as I do that the Creator of this World is a very Cruel Being & being a Worshipper of Christ, I cannot help saying: "the Son, O how unlike the Father!" First God Almighty comes with a Thump on the Head. Then Jesus Christ comes with a balm to heal it.”

William Blake

A Vision of the Last Judgment
1810s

God , World , Thinking , Help

“SUCH VISIONS HAVE APPEARD TO ME
AS I MY ORDERD RACE HAVE RUN
JERUSALEM IS NAMED LIBERTY
AMONG THE SONS OF ALBION”

William Blake

Source: 1800s, Jerusalem The Emanation of The Giant Albion (c. 1803–1820), Ch. 1, plate 26, lines 1-4

“Terror in the house does roar,
But Pity stands before the door.”

William Blake

Terror in the House
1800s, Poems from Blake's Notebook (c. 1804)

Housing

“How have you left the ancient love
That bards of old enjoyed in you!
The languid strings do scarcely move!
The sound is forced, the notes are few!”

William Blake To the Muses

To the Muses, st. 4
1780s, Poetical Sketches (1783)

Love

“I asked a thief to steal me a peach:
He turned up his eyes.
I asked a lithe lady to lie her down:
Holy and meek, she cries.

As soon as I went
An angel came.
He winked at the thief
And smiled at the dame—

And without one word said
Had a peach from the tree,
And still as a maid
Enjoyed the lady.”

William Blake

I Asked a Thief
1790s, Poems from Blake's Notebook (c. 1791-1792)

Lie , Smile , Angels , Tree

“Reason, or the ratio of all we have already known, is not the same that it shall be when we know more.”

William Blake

There Is No Natural Religion (1788)
1780s

“Every tear from every eye
Becomes a babe in eternity.”

William Blake

Source: 1800s, Auguries of Innocence (1803), Line 67

Tear

“All wholesome food is caught without a net or a trap.”

William Blake

Source: 1790s, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790–1793), Proverbs of Hell, Line 13

Food

“When a Man has Married a Wife
He finds out whether
Her Knees & elbows are only
glued together.”

William Blake

Poems from Blake's Notebook (c. 1800–1803)
1800s

“How sweet I roamed from field to field,
And tasted all the summer's pride,
Till I the prince of love beheld,
Who in the sunny beams did glide!”

William Blake

Song (How Sweet I Roamed), st. 1
1780s, Poetical Sketches (1783)

Love , Summer

“A robin redbreast in a cage
Puts all Heaven in a rage.”

William Blake

Source: 1800s, Auguries of Innocence (1803), Line 5

Rage

“To Generalize is to be an Idiot. To Particularize is the Alone Distinction of Merit — General Knowledges are those Knowledges that Idiots possess.”

William Blake

Annotations to Sir Joshua Reynolds's Discourses, pp. xvii–xcviii (c. 1798–1809)
1790s

Knowledge

“Jesus & his apostles & disciples were all artists”

William Blake

The Laocoön, p. 271
1800s

“The sword sung on the barren heath,
The sickle in the fruitful field;
The sword he sung a song of death,
But could not make the sickle yield.”

William Blake

The Sword Sung
1790s, Poems from Blake's Notebook (c. 1791-1792)

Death

“It is not because Angels are Holier than Men or Devils that makes them Angels but because they do not Expect Holiness from one another but from God only”

William Blake

1810s
Source: A Vision of the Last Judgment

Men , God , Angels

“O Saviour pour upon me thy Spirit of meekness & love:
Annihilate the Selfhood in me, be thou all my life!
Guide thou my hand which trembles exceedingly upon the rock of ages”

William Blake

Source: 1800s, Jerusalem The Emanation of The Giant Albion (c. 1803–1820), Ch. 1, plate 5, lines 21-23 The Words of Blake

Love , Life , Age

“Sleep, sleep, beauty bright,
Dreaming o'er the joys of night.
Sleep, sleep: in thy sleep
Little sorrows sit and weep.”

William Blake A Cradle Song

A Cradle Song, st. 1
1790s, Poems from Blake's Notebook (c. 1791-1792)

Beauty , Dreams , Sleep , Joy

“The modest Rose puts forth a thorn,
The humble sheep a threat’ning horn:
While the Lily white shall in love delight,
Nor a thorn nor a threat stain her beauty bright.”

William Blake

The Lily
1790s, Songs of Experience (1794)

Love , Beauty

“My mother groan'd! my father wept.
Into the dangerous world I leapt:
Helpless, naked, piping loud:
Like a fiend hid in a cloud.”

William Blake

Infant Sorrow, st. 1
1790s, Songs of Experience (1794)

World

“But most, thro' midnight streets I hear
How the youthful Harlot’s curse
Blasts the new born Infant’s tear,
And blights with plagues the Marriage hearse.”

William Blake London

London, st. 4
1790s, Songs of Experience (1794)

Marriage , Youth , Tear

“You cannot have Liberty in this world without what you call Moral Virtue & you cannot have Moral Virtue without the Slavery of that half of the Human Race who hate what you call Moral Virtue”

William Blake

A Vision of the Last Judgment
1810s

Hate , World

“But Want of Money & the Distress of A Thief can never be alleged as the Cause of his Thieving, for many honest people endure greater hard ships with Fortitude. We must therefore seek the Cause else where than in want of Money for that is the Misers passion, not the Thiefs.”

William Blake

1790s, Letter to Revd. Dr. Trusler (1799)

Money , People , Passion

“They have divided themselves by Wrath. they must be united by
Pity<…”

William Blake

Source: Jerusalem The Emanation of The Giant Albion (c. 1803–1820), Ch. 1, plate 7, lines 57-58 The Words of Los to his Spectre

“Every Thing has its Vermin O Spectre of the Sleeping Dead!”

William Blake

Frontiespiece, plate 1, line 11 (as it seen on the additional plate, Fitzwilliam Museum).
1800s, Jerusalem The Emanation of The Giant Albion (c. 1803–1820)

Sleep , Dead

“If you have formed a circle to go into,
Go into it yourself and see how you would do.”

William Blake To God

To God
1800s, Poems from Blake's Notebook (c. 1807-1809)

“The reason Milton wrote in fetters when he wrote of Angels and God, and at liberty when of Devils and Hell, is because he was a true poet and of the Devils' party without knowing it.”

William Blake

Note to The Voice of the Devil
1790s, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790–1793)

God , Angels , Hell

“Degrade first the arts if you'd mankind degrade,
Hire idiots to paint with cold light and hot shade.”

William Blake

Annotations to Sir Joshua Reynolds's Discourses, title page (c. 1798–1809)
1790s

Art , Light , Painting

“Forgiveness of enemies can only come upon their repentance.”

William Blake

1780s, Annotations to Lavater (1788)

Forgiveness

“The iron hand crush'd the Tyrant's head
And became a Tyrant in his stead.”

William Blake

Ibid, stanza 9
1810s, Miscellaneous poems and fragments from the Nonesuch edition

“Grown old in love from seven till seven times seven,
I oft have wished for Hell for ease from Heaven.”

William Blake

Grown Old in Love
1800s, Poems from Blake's Notebook (c. 1807-1809)

Love , Hell , Time

“God wants not man to humble himself:
That is the trick of the Ancient Elf.
This is the race that Jesus ran:
Humble to God, haughty to man,
Cursing the Rulers before the people
Even to the Temple’s highest steeple,
And when He humbled Himself to God
Then descended the cruel rod.
‘If Thou Humblest Thyself, Thou humblest Me.
Thou also dwell’st in Eternity.”

William Blake

1810s, The Everlasting Gospel (c. 1818)

God , People

“Every Harlot was a Virgin once”

William Blake book For the Sexes: The Gates of Paradise

For the Sexes: The Gates of Paradise: [Epilogue] To The Accuser who is The God of This World
1810s

“Nothing can be more contemptible than to suppose Public RECORDS to be True.”

William Blake

Annotations to An Apology for the Bible by R. Watson
1790s

“Why art thou silent and invisible,
Father of Jealousy?”

William Blake

To Nobodaddy, st. 1
1790s, Poems from Blake's Notebook (c. 1791-1792)

Jealousy , Art

“Love to faults is always blind,
Always is to joys inclined,
Lawless, winged, and unconfined,
And breaks all chains from every mind.”

William Blake

Love to Faults
1790s, Poems from Blake's Notebook (c. 1791-1792)

Love , Joy

“And we are put on earth a little space,
That we may learn to bear the beams of love,
And these black bodies and this sunburnt face
Is but a cloud, and like a shady grove.”

William Blake The Little Black Boy

The Little Black Boy, st. 4
1780s, Songs of Innocence (1789–1790)

Love , Learning

“Like a fiend in a cloud,
With howling woe,
After night I do crowd,
And with night will go;
I turn my back to the east,
From whence comforts have increased;
For light doth seize my brain
With frantic pain.”

William Blake

Mad Song, st. 3
1780s, Poetical Sketches (1783)

Pain , Light , Night

“Seeing this False Christ, in fury and passion
I made my voice heard all over the nation.
…
I am sure this Jesus will not do
Either for Englishman or Jew.”

William Blake

1810s, The Everlasting Gospel (c. 1818)

Passion , Christ , Falseness

“In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand dare seize the fire?”

William Blake

St. 2
1790s, The Tyger (1794)

Distant

“The Foundation of Empire is Art & Science Remove them or Degrade them & the Empire is No More — Empire follows Art & Not Vice Versa as Englishmen suppose.”

William Blake

Annotations to Sir Joshua Reynolds's Discourses
1790s

Art , Science

“The Goddess Fortune is the devils servant ready to Kiss any ones Arse.”

William Blake

Inscription on Illustrations to Dante "No. 16: HELL Canto 7"
1810s

Kiss

“This cabinet is formed of gold
And pearl and crystal shining bright,
And within it opens into a world
And a little lovely moony night.”

William Blake

The Crystal Cabinet, st. 2
1800s, Poems from the Pickering Manuscript (c. 1805)

Love , World , Night

“The fields from Islington to Marybone,
To Primrose Hill and Saint John's Wood:
Were builded over with pillars of gold,
And there Jerusalems pillars stood.”

William Blake

Source: 1800s, Jerusalem The Emanation of The Giant Albion (c. 1803–1820), Ch. 1, plate 27, "To the Jews" 1) lines 1-4

“Piping down the valleys wild,
Piping songs of pleasant glee,
On a cloud I saw a child,
And he laughing said to me:
"Pipe a song about a Lamb."
So I piped with merry cheer;
"Piper, pipe that song again."”

William Blake Songs of Innocence

So I piped; he wept to hear.
Introduction, st. 1–2
Songs of Innocence (1789–1790)

“The harlot's cry from street to street
Shall weave old England's winding sheet.”

William Blake

Source: 1800s, Auguries of Innocence (1803), Line 115

Cry

“One thought fills immensity.”

William Blake

Source: 1790s, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790–1793), Proverbs of Hell, Line 36

“In the morning glad I see
My foe outstretch'd beneath the tree.”

William Blake

Ibid., st. 4
1790s, Songs of Experience (1794)

Tree

“Half Friendship is the bitterest Enmity…”

William Blake

Frontiespiece, plate 1, line 8 (as it seen on the additional plate, Fitzwilliam Museum).
1800s, Jerusalem The Emanation of The Giant Albion (c. 1803–1820)

Friendship

“Commerce is so far from being beneficial to Arts or to Empire, that it is destructive of both, as all their History shows, for the above Reason of Individual Merit being its Great Hatred. Empires flourish till they become Commercial & then they are scattered abroad to the four winds”

William Blake

Public Address, Blake's Notebook c. 1810
1810s

Art , History

“He who shall hurt the little wren
Shall never be beloved by men.”

William Blake

Source: 1800s, Auguries of Innocence (1803), Line 29

Men , Hurt