Chapter II

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

Her Little-ones ran on the fields,
The Lamb of God among them seen,
And fair Jerusalem his Bride,
Among the little meadows green.

Pancrass & Kentish-town repose
Among her golden pillars high:
Among her golden arches which
Shine upon the starry sky.

The Jew's-harp-house & the Green Man,
The Ponds where Boys to bathe delight,
The fields of Cows by William's farm,
Shine in Jerusalem's pleasant sight.

She walks upon our meadows green:
The Lamb of God walks by her side:
And every English Child is seen,
Children of Jesus & his Bride.

Forgiving trespasses and sins
Lest Babylon with cruel Og,
With Moral & Self-righteous Law,
Should Crucify in Satan's Synagogue!

What are those golden Builders doing
Near mournful ever-weeping Paddington,
Standing above that mighty Ruin
Where Satan the first victory won,

Where Albion slept beneath the Fatal Tree,
And the Druids' golden Knife
Rioted in human gore,
In Offerings of Human Life?

They groan'd aloud on London Stone,
They groan'd aloud on Tyburn's Brook,
Albion gave his deadly groan,
And all the Atlantic Mountains shook.

Albion's Spectre from his Loins,
Tore forth in all the pomp of War:
Satan his name: in flames of fire
He stretch'd his Druid Pillars far.

Jerusalem fell from Lambeth's Vale,
Down thro' Poplar & Old Bow;
Thro' Maiden & acros the Sea,
In War & howling, death & woe.

The Rhine was red with human blood;
The Danube roll'd a purple tide;
On the Euphrates Satan stood,
And over Asia stretch'd his pride.

He wither'd up sweet Zion's Hill,
From every Nation of the Earth;
He wither'd up Jerusalem's Gates,
And in a dark Land gave her birth.

He wither'd up the Human Form,
By laws of sacrifice for sin,
Till it became a Mortal Worm;
But O! translucent all within.

The Divine Vision still was seen,
Still was the Human Form Divine,
Weeping in weak & mortal clay,
Jesus, still the Form was thine.

And thine the Human Face, & thine
The Human Hands & Feet & Breath,
Entering thro' the Gates of Birth,
And passing thro' the Gates of Death.

And O thou Lamb of God, whom I
Slew in my dark self-righteous pride,
Art thou return'd to Albion's Land?
And is Jerusalem thy Bride?

Come to my arms & never more
Depart; but dwell for ever here:
Create my Spirit to thy Love:
Subdue my Spectre to thy Fear.

Spectre of Albion! warlike Fiend!
In clouds of blood & ruin roll'd:
I here reclaim thee as my own,
My Self-hood! Satan! arm'd in gold.

Is this thy soft Family-Love,
Thy cruel Patriarchal pride,
Planting thy Family alone,
Destroying all the World beside?

A man's worst enemies are those
Of his own house & family;
And he who makes his law a curse,
By his own hand shall surely die.

In my Exchanges every Land
Shall walk, & mine in every Land,
Mutual, shall build Jerusalem;
Both heart in heart & hand in hand.

EVERY ornament of perfection, and every labour of love,
In all the Garden of Eden, & in all the golden mountains,
Was become an envied horror, and a remembrance of jealousy:
And every Act a Crime, and Albion the punisher & judge.

And Albion spoke from his secret seat and said:

All these ornaments are crimes, they are made by the labours
Of loves: of unnatural consanguinities and friendships,
Horrid to think of when enquired deeply into: and all
These hills & valleys are accursed witnesses of Sin.
I therefore condense them into solid rocks, stedfast:
A foundation and certainty and demonstrative truth:
That Man be separate from Man, & here I plant my seat.

Cold snows drifted around him: ice cover'd his loins around.
He sat by Tyburn's brook, and underneath his heel shot up
A deadly Tree: he nam'd it Moral Virtue, and the Law
Of God who dwells in Chaos hidden from the human sight.

The Tree spread over him its cold shadows, (Albion groan'd)
They bent down, they felt the earth and again enrooting
Shot into many a Tree: an endless labyrinth of woe!
From willing sacrifice of Self, to sacrifice of (miscall'd) Enemies
For Atonement: Albion began to erect twelve Altars,
Of rough unhewn rocks, before the Potter's Furnace.
He nam'd them Justice, and Truth. And Albion's Sons
Must have become the first Victims, being the first transgressors:
But they fled to the mountains to seek ransom: building A Strong
Fortification against the Divine Humanity and Mercy,
In Shame & Jealousy to annihilate Jerusalem!

THEN the Divine Vision like a silent Sun appear'd above
Albion's dark rocks: setting behind the Gardens of Kensington
On Tyburn's River: in clouds of blood: where was mild Zion Hill's
Most ancient promontory: and in the Sun, a Human Form appear'd,
And thus the Voice Divine went forth upon the rocks of Albion.

I elected Albion for my glory: I gave to him the Nations
Of the whole Earth. He was the Angel of my Presence: and all
The Sons of God were Albion's Sons: and Jerusalem was my joy.
The Reactor hath hid himself thro' envy. I behold him,
But you cannot behold him till he be reveal'd in his System.
Albion's Reactor must have a Place prepar'd. Albion must Sleep
The Sleep of Death, till the Man of Sin & Repentance be reveal'd.
Hidden in Albion's Forests he lurks: he admits of no Reply
From Albion: but hath founded his Reaction into a Law
Of Action, for Obedience to destroy the Contraries of Man.
He hath compell'd Albion to become a Punisher & hath possess'd
Himself of Albion's Forests & Wilds: and Jerusalem is taken,
The City of the Woods in the Forest of Ephratah is taken!
London is a stone of her ruins: Oxford is the dust of her walls:
Sussex & Kent are her scatter 'd garments: Ireland her holy place:
And the murder'd bodies of her little ones are Scotland and Wales.
The Cities of the Nations are the smoke of her consummation,
The Nations are her dust, ground by the chariot wheels
Of her lordly conquerors, her palaces levell'd with the dust.
I come that I may find a way for my banished ones to return.
Fear not, O little Flock, I come: Albion shall rise again.

So saying, the mild Sun inclos'd the Human Family.

Forthwith from Albion's darkning locks came two Immortal forms,
Saying: We alone are escaped, O merciful Lord and Saviour,
We flee from the interiors of Albion's hills and mountains;
From his Valleys Eastward; from Amalek, Canaan & Moab;
Beneath his vast ranges of hills surrounding Jerusalem.

Albion walk'd on the steps of fire before his Halls,
And Vala walk'd with him in dreams of soft deluding slumber.
He looked up & saw the Prince of Light with splendor faded.
Then Albion ascended mourning into the porches of his Palace:
Above him rose a Shadow from his wearied intellect
Of living gold, pure, perfect, holy; in white linen pure he hover'd,

A sweet entrancing self-delusion, a wat'ry vision of Albion,
Soft exulting in existence; all the Man absorbing.

Albion fell upon his face prostrate before the wat'ry Shadow,
Saying: O Lord whence is this change? thou knowest I am nothing!
And Vala trembled & cover'd her face; & her locks were spread on the pavement.

We heard astonish'd at the Vision & our hearts trembled within us;
We heard the voice of slumberous Albion, and thus he spake,
Idolatrous to his own Shadow words of eternity uttering:

O I am nothing when I enter into judgment with thee!
If thou withdraw thy breath I die & vanish into Hades,
If thou dost lay thine hand upon me, behold I am silent:
If thou withhold thine hand, I perish like a fallen leaf.
O I am nothing: and to nothing must return again:
If thou withdraw thy breath, Behold I am oblivion.

He ceas'd; the shadowy voice was silent: but the cloud hover'd over their heads
In golden wreathes, the sorrow of Man; & the balmy drops fell down.
And lo! that son of Man, that Shadowy Spirit of mild Albion,
Luvah descended from the cloud: in terror Albion rose:
Indignant rose the awful Man, & turn'd his back on Vala.

We heard the voice of Albion starting from his sleep:

Whence is this voice crying, Enion! that soundeth in my ears?
O cruel pity! O dark deceit! can love seek for dominion?

And Luvah strove to gain dominion over Albion:
They strove together above the Body where Vala was inclos'd,
And the dark Body of Albion left prostrate upon the crystal pavement:
Cover'd with boils from head to foot: the terrible smitings of Luvah.

Then frown'd the fallen Man, and put forth Luvah from his presence,
Saying, Go and Die the Death of Man, for Vala the sweet wanderer.
I will turn the volutions of your ears outward, and bend your nostrils
Downward, and your fluxile eyes englob'd roll round in fear;
Your with'ring lips and tongue shrink up into a narrow circle,
Till into narrow forms you creep: go take your fiery way:
And learn what 'tis to absorb the Man, you Spirits of Pity & Love.

They heard the voice and fled swift as the winter's setting sun.
And now the human blood foam'd high, the Spirits Luvah & Vala
Went down the Human Heart where Paradise & its joys abounded,
In jealous fears & fury & rage, & flames roll round their fervid feet:
And the vast form of Nature like a serpent play'd before them.
And as they fled in folding fires & thunders of the deep,

Vala shrunk in like the dark sea that leaves its slimy banks,
And from her bosom Luvah fell far as the east and West.
And the vast form of Nature like a serpent roll'd between,
Whether of Jerusalem's or Vala's ruins congenerated we know not:
All is confusion: all is tumult, & we alone are escaped.

So spoke the fugitives; they join'd the Divine Family, trembling.

AND the Two that escaped were the Emanation of Los & his
Spectre: for where ever the Emanation goes, the Spectre
Attends her as her Guard, & Los's Emanation is named
Enitharmon, & his Spectre is named Urthona: they knew
Not where to flee: they had been on a visit to Albion's Children:
And they strove to weave a Shadow of the Emanation
To hide themselves: weeping & lamenting for the Vegetation
Of Albion's Children; fleeing thro Albion's vales in streams of gore.
Being not irritated by insult, bearing insulting benevolences,
They percieved that corporeal friends are spiritual enemies:
They saw the Sexual Religion in its embryon Uncircumcision.
And the Divine hand was upon them bearing them thro' darkness,
Back safe to their Humanity as doves to their windows:
Therefore the Sons of Eden praise Urthona's Spectre in Songs
Because he kept the Divine Vision in time of trouble.
They wept & trembled: & Los put forth his hand, & took them in,
Into his Bosom; from which Albion shrunk in dismal pain;
Bending the fibres of Brotherhood, & in Feminine Allegories
Inclosing Los; but the Divine Vision appear'd with Los,
Following Albion into his Central Void among his Oaks.
And Los prayed and said, O Divine Saviour arise
Upon the Mountains of Albion as in ancient time. Behold!
The Cities of Albion seek thy face, London groans in pain
From Hill to Hill & the Thames laments along the Valleys:
The little Villages of Middlesex & Surrey hunger & thirst:
The Twenty -eight Cities of Albion stretch their hands to thee,
Because of the Opressors of Albion in every City & Village:
They mock at the Labourer's limbs! they mock at his starv'd Children.
They buy his Daughters that they may have power to sell his Sons;
They compell the Poor to live upon a crust of bread by soft mild arts;
They reduce the Man to want, then give with pomp & ceremony.
The praise of Jehovah is chaunted from lips of hunger & thirst.
Humanity knows not of Sex: wherefore are Sexes in Beulah?
In Beulah the Female lets down her beautiful Tabernacle,
Which the Male enters magnificent between her Cherubim,
And becomes One with her, mingling, condensing in Self-love,
The Rocky law of Condemnation & double Generation, & Death.
Albion hath enter 'd the Loins, the place of the Last Judgment:
And Luvah hath drawn the Curtains around Albion in Vala's bosom.
The Dead awake to Generation! Arise O Lord, & rend the Veil!
So Los in lamentations follow'd Albion. Albion cover'd

HIS western heaven with rocky clouds of death & despair.
Fearing that Albion should turn his back against the Divine Vision
Los took his globe of fire to search the interiors of Albion's
Bosom, in all the terrors of friendship, entering the caves
Of despair & death, to search the tempters out, walking among
Albion's rocks & precipices: caves of solitude & dark despair.
And saw every Minute Particular of Albion degraded & murder'd,
But saw not by whom; they were hidden within in the minute particulars
Of which they had possess'd themselves: and there they take up
The articulations of a man's soul, and laughing throw it down
Into the frame, then knock it out upon the plank, & souls are bak'd
In bricks to build the pyramids of Heber & Terah. But Los
Search'd in vain; clos'd from the minutia he walk'd, difficult
He came down from Highgate thro' Hackney & Holloway towards London,
Till he came to old Stratford & thence to Stepney & the Isle
Of Leutha's Dogs, thence thro' the narrows of the River's side
And saw every minute particular, the jewels of Albion, running down
The kennels of the streets & lanes as if they were abhorr'd.
Every Universal Form was become barren mountains of Moral
Virtue; and every Minute Particular harden'd into grains of sand:
And all the tendernesses of the soul cast forth as filth & mire.
Among the winding places of deep contemplation intricate,
To where the Tower of London frown'd dreadful over Jerusalem;
A building of Luvah builded in Jerusalem's eastern gate to be
His secluded Court: thence to Bethlehem where was builded
Dens of despair in the house of bread; enquiring in vain
Of stones and rocks he took his way, for human form was none:
And thus he spoke, looking on Albion's City with many tears.
What shall I do? what could I do, if I could find these Criminals?
I could not dare to take vengeance: for all things are so constructed
And builded by the Divine hand that the sinner shall always escape,
And he who takes vengeance alone is the criminal of Providence:
If I should dare to lay my finger on a grain of sand
In way of vengeance, I punish the already punish'd; O whom
Should I pity if I pity not the sinner who is gone astray?
O Albion, if thou takest vengeance, if thou revengest thy wrongs,
Thou art for ever lost! What can I do to hinder the Sons
Of Albion from taking vengeance? or how shall I them perswade?
So spoke Los, travelling thro' darkness & horrid solitude:
And he beheld Jerusalem in Westminster & Marybone,
Among the ruins of the Temple; and Vala who is her Shadow.
Jerusalem's Shadow bent northward over the Island white.
At length he sat on London Stone, & heard Jerusalem's voice.
Albion, I cannot be thy Wife, thine own Minute Particulars
Belong to God alone, and all thy little ones are holy,
They are of Faith & not of Demonstration: wherefore is Vala
Cloth'd in black mourning upon my river's currents? Vala awake!
I hear thy shuttles sing in the sky, and round my limbs
I feel the iron threads of love & jealousy & despair.
Vala reply'd. Albion is mine! Luvah gave me to Albion,
And now recieves reproach & hate. Was it not said of old,
Set your Son before a man & he shall take you & your sons
For slaves; but set your Daughter before a man & She
Shall make him & his sons & daughters your slaves for ever.
And is this Faith? Behold the strife of Albion & Luvah
Is great in the east, their spears of blood rage in the eastern heaven.
Urizen is the champion of Albion, they will slay my Luvah:
And thou, O harlot daughter, daughter of despair, art all
This cause of these shakings of my towers on Euphrates.
Here is the House of Albion, & here is thy secluded place,
And here we have found thy sins; & hence we turn thee forth,
For all to avoid thee; to be astonish'd at thee for thy sins;
Because thou art the impurity & the harlot; & thy children,
Children of whoredoms; born for Sacrifice, for the meat & drink
Offering: to sustain the glorious combat & the battle & war,
That Man may be purified by the death of thy delusions.
So saying she her dark threads cast over the trembling River,
And over the valleys; from the hills of Hertfordshire to the hills
Of Surrey across Middlesex, & across Albion's House
Of Eternity; pale stood Albion at his eastern gate,
LEANING against the pillars, & his disease rose from his skirts:
Upon the Precipice he stood; ready to fall into Non-Entity.

Los was all astonishment & terror; he trembled sitting on the Stone
Of London; but the interiors of Albion's fibres & nerves were hidden
From Los; astonish'd he beheld only the petrified surfaces;
And saw his Furnaces in ruins, for Los is the Demon of the Furnaces.
He saw also the Four Points of Albion revers'd inwards:
He siez'd his Hammer & Tongs, his iron Poker & his Bellows,
Upon the valleys of Middlesex, Shouting loud for aid Divine.

In stern defiance came from Albion's bosom Hand, Hyle, Koban,
Gwantok, Peachey, Brertun, Slaid, Huttn, Skofeld, Kock, Kotope,

Bowen; Albion's Sons; they bore him a golden couch into the porch,
And on the Couch repos'd his limbs, trembling from the bloody field,
Rearing their Druid Patriarchal rocky Temples around his limbs.

(All things begin & end, in Albion's Ancient Druid Rocky Shore.)

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 camest 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

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.

THEN the Divine hand found the Two Limits, Satan and Adam,
In Albion's bosom; for in every Human bosom those Limits stand.
And the Divine voice came from the Furnaces, as multitudes without
Number! the voices of the innumerable multitudes of Eternity:
And the appearance of a Man was seen in the Furnaces,
Saving those who have sinned from the punishment of the Law,
(In pity of the punisher whose state is eternal death,)
And keeping them from Sin by the mild counsels of his love.

Albion goes to Eternal Death: In Me all Eternity
Must pass thro' condemnation, and awake beyond the Grave:
No individual can keep these Laws, for they are death
To every energy of man, and forbid the springs of life.
Albion hath enter'd the State Satan! Be permanent O State!
And be thou for ever accursed! that Albion may arise again.

And be thou created into a State! I go forth to Create
States! to deliver Individuals evermore! Amen.

So spoke the voice from the Furnaces, descending into Non-Entity.

REUBEN return'd to his place, in vain he sought beautiful Tirzah,
For his Eyelids were narrow'd, & his Nostrils scented the ground.
And Sixty Winters Los raged in the Divisions of Reuben,
Building the Moon of Ulro, plank by plank & rib by rib.
Reuben slept in the Cave of Adam, and Los folded his Tongue
Between Lips of mire & clay, then sent him forth over Jordan.
In the love of Tirzah he said: Doubt is my food day & night.
All that beheld him fled howling and gnawed their tongues
For pain: they became what they beheld. In reasonings Reuben returned
To Heshbon: disconsolate he walk'd thro' Moab & he stood
Before the Furnaces of Los in a horrible dreamful slumber,
On Mount Gilead looking toward Gilgal: and Los bended
His Ear in a spiral circle outward; then sent him over Jordan.

The Seven Nations fled before him, they became what they beheld:
Hand, Hyle & Coban fled; they became what they beheld:
Gwantock & Peachey hid in Damascus beneath Mount Lebanon,
Brereton & Slade in Egypt, Hutton & Skofeld & Kox
Fled over Chaldea in terror, in pains in every nerve,
Kotope & Bowen became what they beheld, fleeing over the Earth:
And the Twelve Female Emanations fled with them agonizing.

Jerusalem trembled seeing her Children driv'n by Los's Hammer,
In the visions of the dreams of Beulah, on the edge of Non-Entity.
Hand stood between Reuben & Merlin, as the Reasoning Spectre
Stands between the Vegetative Man & his Immortal Imagination.

And the Four Zoas clouded rage, East & West & North & South:
They change their situations, in the Universal Man.
Albion groans, he sees the Elements divide before his face,
And England, who is Brittannia, divided into Jerusalem & Vala:
And Urizen assumes the East, Luvah assumes the South,
Is his dark Spectre ravening from his open Sepulcher.

And the Four Zoas, who are the Four Eternal Senses of Man,
Became Four Elements separating from the Limbs of Albion:
These are their names in the Vegetative Generation.
And Accident & Chance were found hidden in Length, Bredth & Highth:
And they divided into Four ravening deathlike Forms,
Fairies & Genii & Nymphs & Gnomes of the Elements:
These are States Permanently Fixed by the Divine Power.

The Atlantic Continent sunk round Albion's cliffy shore,
And the Sea poured in amain upon the Giants of Albion,
As Los bended the Senses of Reuben. Reuben is Merlin
Exploring the Three States of Ulro; Creation, Redemption, & Judgment.

And many of the Eternal Ones laughed after their manner:

Have you known the Judgment that is arisen among the
Zoas of Albion; where a Man dare hardly to embrace
His own Wife, for the terrors of Chastity that they call
By the name of Morality; their Daughters govern all
In hidden deceit! they are Vegetable, only fit for burning.
Art & Science cannot exist but by Naked Beauty display 'd.

Then those in Great Eternity who contemplate on Death
Said thus, What seems to Be; Is; To those to whom
It seems to Be, & is productive of the most dreadful
Consequences to those to whom it seems to Be; even of
Torments, Despair, Eternal Death; but the Divine Mercy
Steps beyond and Redeems Man in the Body of Jesus. Amen.
And Length, Bredth, Highth again Obey the Divine Vision. Hallelujah.

AND One stood forth from the Divine family & said:

I feel my Spectre rising upon me! Albion! arouze thyself!
Why dost thou thunder with frozen Spectrous wrath against us?
The Spectre is, in Giant Man, insane, and most deform'd.
Thou wilt certainly provoke my Spectre against thine in fury!
He has a Sepulcher hewn out of a Rock ready for thee:
And a Death of Eight thousand years forg'd by thyself, upon
The point of his Spear! if thou persistest to forbid with Laws
Our Emanations, and to attack our secret supreme delights.

So Los spoke: But when he saw blue death in Albion's feet
Again he join'd the Divine Body, following, merciful,
While Albion fled more indignant: revengeful covering

HIS face and bosom with petrific hardness, and his hands
And feet, lest any should enter his bosom & embrace
His hidden heart: his Emanation wept & trembled within him:
Uttering not his jealousy, but hiding it as with
Iron and steel, dark and opake, with clouds & tempests brooding:
His strong limbs shudder'd upon his mountains high and dark.

Turning from Universal Love petrific as he went,
His cold against the warmth of Eden rag'd with loud
Thunders of deadly war (the fever of the human soul)
Fires and clouds of rolling smoke! but, mild, the Saviour follow'd him,

Displaying the Eternal Vision, the Divine Similitude,
In loves and tears of brothers, sisters, sons, fathers and friends,
Which if Man ceases to behold, he ceases to exist:

Saying, Albion! Our wars are wars of life, & wounds of love,
With intellectual spears, & long winged arrows of thought:
Mutual in one another's love and wrath all renewing
We live as One Man: for contracting our infinite senses
We behold multitude: or expanding, we behold as one.
As One Man all the Universal Family: and that One Man
We call Jesus the Christ: and he in us, and we in him,
Live in perfect harmony in Eden the land of life,
Giving, recieving, and forgiving each other's trespasses.
He is the Good shepherd, he is the Lord and master:
He is the Shepherd of Albion, he is all in all,
In Eden: in the garden of God: and in heavenly Jerusalem.
If we have offended, forgive us, take not vengeance against us.

Thus speaking, the Divine Family follow Albion:
I see them in the Vision of God upon my pleasant valleys.

I behold London; a Human awful wonder of God!
He says, Return, Albion, return! I give myself for thee:
My Streets are my Ideas of Imagination.
Awake Albion, awake! and let us awake up together.
My Houses are Thoughts; my Inhabitants, Affections,
The children of my thoughts, walking within my blood-vessels,
Shut from my nervous form which sleeps upon the verge of Beulah,
In dreams of darkness, while my vegetating blood, in veiny pipes,
Rolls dreadful thro' the Furnaces of Los, and the Mills of Satan.
For Albion's sake, and for Jerusalem thy Emanation
I give myself, and these my brethren give themselves for Albion.

So spoke London, immortal Guardian! I heard in Lambeth's shades:
In Felpham I heard and saw the Visions of Albion:
I write in South Molton Street, what I both see and hear,
In regions of Humanity, in London's opening streets.

I see thee, awful Parent Land, in light, behold I see!
Verulam! Canterbury! venerable parent of men,
Generous immortal Guardian golden clad! for Cities
Are Men, fathers of multitudes, and Rivers & Mountains
Are also Men; every thing is Human, mighty! sublime!
In every bosom a Universe expands, as wings
Let down at will around, and call'd the Universal Tent.
York, crown'd with loving kindness: Edinburgh, cloth'd
With fortitude as with a garment of immortal texture,
Woven in looms of Eden, in spiritual deaths of mighty men

Who give themselves, in Golgotha, Victims to Justice; where
There is in Albion a Gate of precious stones and gold,
Seen only by Emanations, by vegetations, viewless,
Bending across the road of Oxford Street; it from Hyde Park
To Tyburn's deathful shades, admits the wandering souls
Of multitudes who die from Earth: this Gate cannot be found

BY Satan's Watch-fiends: tho' they search numbering every grain
Of sand on Earth every night, they never find this Gate.
It is the Gate of Los. Withoutside is the Mill, intricate, dreadful
And fill'd with cruel tortures: but no mortal man can find the Mill
Of Satan in his mortal pilgrimage of seventy years,

For Human beauty knows it not: nor can Mercy find it! But
In the Fourth region of Humanity, Urthona nam'd,
Mortality begins to roll the billows of Eternal Death
Before the Gate of Los: Urthona here is named Los,
And here begins the System of Moral Virtue, named Rahab.
Albion fled thro' the Gate of Los, and he stood in the Gate.

Los was the friend of Albion who most lov'd him. In Cambridgeshire
His eternal station, he is the twenty-eighth, & is four-fold.
Seeing Albion had turn'd his back against the Divine Vision,
Los said to Albion. Whither fleest thou? Albion reply'd.

I die! I go to Eternal Death! the shades of death
Hover within me & beneath, and spreading themselves outside
Like rocky clouds, build me a gloomy monument of woe:
Will none accompany me in my death? or be a Ransom for me
In that dark Valley? I have girded round my cloke, and on my feet
Bound these black shoes of death, & on my hands, death's iron gloves.
God hath forsaken me, & my friends are become a burden,
A weariness to me, & the human footstep is a terror to me.

Los answered, troubled, and his soul was rent in twain:
Must the Wise die for an Atonement? does Mercy endure Atonement?
No! It is Moral Severity, & destroys Mercy in its Victim.
So speaking not yet infected with the Error & Illusion

LOS shudder'd at beholding Albion, for his disease
Arose upon him pale and ghastly: and he call'd around
The friends of Albion: trembling at the sight of Eternal Death
The four appear'd with their Emanations in fiery
Chariots: black their fires roll, beholding Albion's House of Eternity.
Damp couch the flames beneath, and silent, sick, stand shuddering
Before the Porch of sixteen pillars: weeping every one
Descended and fell down upon their knees round Albion's knees,
Swearing the Oath of God! with awful voice of thunders round
Upon the hills & valleys, and the cloudy Oath roll'd far and wide.
Albion is sick! said every Valley, every mournful Hill
And every River: our brother Albion is sick to death.
He hath leagued himself with robbers: he hath studied the arts
Of unbelief: Envy hovers over him: his Friends are his abhorrence:
Those who give their lives for him are despised:
Those who devour his soul, are taken into his bosom:
To destroy his Emanation is their intention.
Arise! awake, O Friends of the Giant Albion!
They have perswaded him of horrible falshoods:
They have sown errors over all his fruitful fields!

The Twenty-four heard! they came trembling on wat'ry chariots,
Borne by the Living Creatures of the third procession
Of Human Majesty: the Living Creatures wept aloud as they
Went along Albion's roads, till they arriv'd at Albion's House.

O! how the torments of Eternal Death waited on Man:
And the loud-rending bars of the Creation ready to burst:
That the wide world might fly from its hinges, & the immortal mansion
Of Man for ever be possess'd by monsters of the deeps:
And Man himself become a Fiend, wrap'd in an endless curse,
Consuming and consum'd for-ever in flames of Moral Justice.

For had the Body of Albion fall'n down, and from its dreadful ruins
Let loose the enormous Spectre on the darkness of the deep,
At enmity with the Merciful & fill'd with devouring fire,
A nether-world must have recieved the foul enormous spirit,
Under pretence of Moral Virtue, fill'd with Revenge and Law.
There to eternity chain'd down, and issuing in red flames
And curses, with his mighty arms brandish'd against the heavens:
Breathing cruelty blood & vengeance, gnashing his teeth with pain,
Torn with black storms, & ceaseless torrents of his own consuming fire:
Within his breast his mighty Sons chain'd down & fill'd with cursings:
And his dark Eon, that once fair crystal form divinely clear,
Within his ribs producing serpents whose souls are flames of fire.
But, glory to the Merciful One, for he is of tender mercies!
And the Divine Family wept over him as One Man.

And these the Twenty-four in whom the Divine Family
Appear'd; and they were One in Him. A Human Vision!
Human Divine, Jesus the Saviour, blessed for ever and ever.

Selsey, true friend! who afterwards submitted to be devoured
By the waves of Despair, whose Emanation rose above
The flood, and was nam'd Chichester, lovely mild & gentle! Lo!
Her lambs bleat to the sea- fowls' cry, lamenting still for Albion.

Submitting to be call'd the son of Los the terrible vision,
Winchester stood devoting himself for Albion: his tents

Outspread with abundant riches, and his Emanations
Submitting to be call'd Enitharmon's daughters, and be born
In vegetable mould: created by the Hammer and Loom
In Bowlahoola & Allamanda where the Dead wail night & day.

(I call them by their English names; English, the rough basement.
Los built the stubborn structure of the Language, acting against
Albion's melancholy, who must else have been a Dumb despair.)

Gloucester and Exeter and Salisbury and Bristol; and benevolent Bath,
BATH who is Legions; he is the Seventh, the physician and
The poisoner; the best and worst in Heaven and Hell;
Whose Spectre first assimilated with Luvah in Albion's mountains.
A triple octave he took, to reduce Jerusalem to twelve,
To cast Jerusalem forth upon the wilds to Poplar & Bow,
To Maiden & Canterbury in the delights of cruelty:
The Shuttles of death sing in the sky to Islington & Pancrass,
Round Marybone to Tyburn's River, weaving black melancholy as a net,
And despair as meshes closely wove over the west of London,
Where mild Jerusalem sought to repose in death & be no more.
She fled to Lambeth's mild Vale and hid herself beneath
The Surrey Hills where Rephaim terminates; her Sons are siez'd
For victims of sacrifice; but Jerusalem cannot be found; Hid
By the Daughters of Beulah, gently snatch'd away, and hid in Beulah.

There is a Grain of Sand in Lambeth that Satan cannot find,
Nor can his Watch Fiends find it; 'tis translucent & has many Angles,
But he who finds it will find Oothoon's palace, for within,
Opening into Beulah, every angle is a lovely heaven.
But should the Watch Fiends find it, they would call it Sin,
And lay its Heavens & their inhabitants in blood of punishment.
Here Jerusalem & Vala were hid in soft slumberous repose,
Hid from the terrible East, shut up in the South & West.

The Twenty-eight trembled in Death's dark caves, in cold despair
They kneel'd around the Couch of Death in deep humiliation
And tortures of self condemnation while their Spectres rag'd within.
The Four Zoas in terrible combustion clouded rage,
Drinking the shuddering fears & loves of Albion's Families,
Destroying by selfish affections the things that they most admire,
Drinking & eating, & pitying & weeping, as at a tragic scene,
The soul drinks murder & revenge, & applauds its own holiness.

They saw Albion endeavouring to destroy their Emanations.

THUS Albion sat, studious of others in his pale disease;
Brooding on evil; but when Los open'd the Furnaces before him,
He saw that the accursed things were his own affections,
And his own beloveds: then he turn'd sick: his soul died within him.
Also Los sick & terrified beheld the Furnaces of Death,
And must have died, but the Divine Saviour descended
Among the infant loves & affections, and the Divine Vision wept
Like evening dew on every herb upon the breathing ground.

Albion spoke in his dismal dreams: O thou deceitful friend,
Worshipping mercy & beholding thy friend in such affliction:
Los! thou now discoverest thy turpitude to the heavens.
I demand righteousness & justice. O thou ingratitude!
Give me my Emanations back, food for my dying soul:
My daughters are harlots: my sons are accursed before me.
Enitharmon is my daughter: accursed with a father's curse:
O! I have utterly been wasted: I have given my daughters to devils.

So spoke Albion in gloomy majesty, and deepest night
Of Ulro roll'd round his skirts from Dover to Cornwall.

Los answer'd. Righteousness & justice I give thee in return
For thy righteousness; but I add mercy also, and bind
Thee from destroying these little ones; am I to be only
Merciful to thee and cruel to all that thou hatest?
Thou wast the Image of God surrounded by the Four Zoas.
Three thou hast slain: I am the Fourth, thou canst not destroy me.
Thou art in Error; trouble me not with thy righteousness.
I have innocence to defend and ignorance to instruct:
I have no time for seeming, and little arts of compliment,
In morality and virtue: in self-glorying and pride.
There is a limit of Opakeness, and a limit of Contraction;
In every Individual Man, and the limit of Opakeness,
Is named Satan; and the limit of Contraction is named Adam.
But when Man sleeps in Beulah, the Saviour in Mercy takes
Contraction's Limit, and of the Limit he forms Woman; That
Himself may in process of time be born Man to redeem.
But there is no Limit of Expansion; there is no Limit of Translucence,
In the bosom of Man for ever from eternity to eternity.
Therefore I break thy bonds of righteousness; I crush thy messengers;
That they may not crush me and mine; do thou be righteous,
And I will return it; otherwise I defy thy worst revenge;

Consider me as thine enemy: on me turn all thy fury:
But destroy not these little ones, nor mock the Lord's anointed:
Destroy not, by Moral Virtue, the little ones whom he hath chosen;
The little ones whom he hath chosen in preference to thee.
He hath cast thee off for ever; the little ones he hath anointed!
Thy Selfhood is for ever accursed from the Divine presence.

So Los spoke: then turn'd his face & wept for Albion.

Albion replied. Go, Hand & Hyle! sieze the abhorred friend:
As you have siez'd the Twenty-four rebellious ingratitudes:
To atone for you, for spiritual death; Man lives by deaths of Men.
Bring him to justice before heaven here upon London stone,
Between Blackheath & Hounslow, between Norwood & Finchley.
All that they have is mine: from my free gen'rous gift,
They now hold all they have; ingratitude to me,
To me their benefactor calls aloud for vengeance deep.

Los stood before his Furnaces awaiting the fury of the Dead;
And the Divine hand was upon him, strengthening him mightily.

The Spectres of the Dead cry out from the deeps beneath
Upon the hills of Albion; Oxford groans in his iron furnace,
Winchester in his den & cavern: they lament against
Albion; they curse their human kindness & affection,
They rage like wild beasts in the forests of affliction,
In the dreams of Ulro they repent of their human kindness.

Come up, build Babylon, Rahab is ours & all her multitudes
With her, in pomp and glory of victory. Depart,
Ye twenty-four, into the deeps; let us depart to glory!

Their Human majestic Forms sit up upon their Couches
Of death: they curb their Spectres as with iron curbs:
They enquire after Jerusalem in the regions of the dead,
With the voices of dead men, low, scarcely articulate,
And with tears cold on their cheeks they weary repose.

O when shall the morning of the grave appear, and when
Shall our salvation come? we sleep upon our watch,
We cannot awake; and our Spectres rage in the forests,
O God of Albion where art thou; pity the watchers!

Thus mourn they. Loud the Furnaces of Los thunder upon
The clouds of Europe & Asia, among the Serpent Temples.

And Los drew his Seven Furnaces around Albion's Altars:
And as Albion built his frozen Altars, Los built the Mundane Shell,
In the Four Regions of Humanity, East & West & North & South,

Till Norwood & Finchley & Blackheath & Hounslow, cover'd the whole Earth.
This is the Net & Veil of Vala, among the Souls of the Dead.

THEY saw their Wheels rising up poisonous against Albion.
Urizen, cold & scientific; Luvah, pitying & weeping;
Tharmas, indolent & sullen; Urthona, doubting & despairing;
Victims to one another & dreadfully plotting against each other
To prevent Albion walking about in the Four Complexions.

They saw America clos'd out by the Oaks of the western shore:
And Tharmas dash'd on the Rocks of the Altars of Victims in Mexico.
If we are wrathful Albion will destroy Jerusalem with rooty Groves,
If we are merciful, ourselves must suffer destruction on his Oaks:
Why should we enter into our Spectres, to behold our own corruptions?
O God of Albion, descend! deliver Jerusalem from the Oaken Groves!

Then Los grew furious raging: Why stand we here trembling around
Calling on God for help; and not ourselves in whom God dwells
Stretching a hand to save the falling Man: are we not Four
Beholding Albion upon the Precipice ready to fall into Non-Entity:
Seeing these Heavens & Hells conglobing in the Void. Heavens over Hells
Brooding in holy hypocritic lust, drinking the cries of pain

From howling victims of Law: building Heavens Twenty-seven-fold.
Swell'd & bloated General Forms, repugnant to the Divine-
Humanity, who is the Only General and Universal Form,
To which all Lineaments tend & seek with love & sympathy,
All broad & general principles belong to benevolence,
Who protects minute particulars, every one in their own identity.
But here the affectionate touch of the tongue is clos'd in by deadly teeth,
And the soft smile of friendship & the open dawn of benevolence
Become a net & a trap, & every energy render'd cruel,
Till the existence of friendship & benevolence is denied:
The wine of the Spirit & the vineyards of the Holy-One
Here turn into poisonous stupor & deadly intoxication,
That they may be condemn'd by Law & the Lamb of God be slain.
And the two Sources of Life in Eternity, Hunting and War,
Are become the Sources of dark & bitter Death & of corroding Hell:
The open heart is shut up in integuments of frozen silence
That the spear that lights it forth may shatter the ribs & bosom.
A pretence of Art, to destroy Art, a pretence of Liberty
To destroy Liberty, a pretence of Religion to destroy Religion.
Oshea and Caleb fight: they contend in the valleys of Peor,
In the terrible Family Contentions of those who love each other:
The Armies of Balaam weep — no women come to the field:
Dead corses lay before them, & not as in Wars of old.
For the Soldier who fights for Truth, calls his enemy his brother:
They fight & contend for life, & not for eternal death!
But here the Soldier strikes, & a dead corse falls at his feet,
Nor Daughter nor Sister nor Mother come forth to embosom the Slain!
But Death! Eternal Death! remains in the Valleys of Peor.
The English are scatter'd over the face of the Nations: are these
Jerusalem's children? Hark! hear the Giants of Albion cry at night.
We smell the blood of the English! we delight in their blood on our Altars:
The living & the dead shall be ground in our rumbling Mills
For bread of the Sons of Albion: of the Giants Hand & Scofield.
Scofeld & Kox are let loose upon my Saxons! they accumulate
A World in which Man is by his Nature the Enemy of Man,
In pride of Selfhood unwieldy stretching out into Non Entity,
Generalizing Art & Science till Art & Science is lost.
Bristol & Bath, listen to my words, & ye Seventeen: give ear!
It is easy to acknowledge a man to be great & good while we
Derogate from him in the trifles & small articles of that goodness:
Those alone are his friends, who admire his minutest powers.
Instead of Albion's lovely mountains & the curtains of Jerusalem,
I see a Cave, a Rock, a Tree deadly and poisonous, unimaginative:
Instead of the Mutual Forgivenesses, the Minute Particulars, I see
Pits of bitumen ever burning, artificial Riches of the Canaanite

Like Lakes of liquid lead, instead of heavenly Chapels, built
By our dear Lord: I see Worlds crusted with snows & ice:
I see a Wicker Idol woven round Jerusalem's children. I see
The Canaanite, the Amalekite, the Moabite, the Egyptian:
By Demonstrations the cruel Sons of Quality & Negation,
Driven on the Void in incoherent despair into Non Entity.
I see America clos'd apart, & Jerusalem driven in terror
Away from Albion's mountains, far away from London's spires:
I will not endure this thing: I alone withstand to death,
This outrage! Ah me! how sick & pale you all stand round me!
Ah me! pitiable ones! do you also go to death's vale?
All you my Friends & Brothers, all you my beloved Companions:
Have you also caught the infection of Sin & stern Repentance?
I see Disease arise upon you! yet speak to me and give
Me some comfort! why do you all stand silent? I alone
Remain in permanent strength. Or is all this goodness & pity, only
That you may take the greater vengeance in your Sepulcher?

So Los spoke. Pale they stood around the House of Death:
In the midst of temptations & despair: among the rooted Oaks:
Among reared Rocks of Albion's Sons: at length they rose

WITH one accord in love sublime, & as on Cherubs' wings
They Albion surround with kindest violence to bear him back
Against his will thro' Los's Gate to Eden: Four-fold, loud,
Their Wings waving over the bottomless Immense: to bear
Their awful charge back to his native home: but Albion, dark,
Repugnant, roll'd his Wheels backward into Non-Entity.
Loud roll the Starry Wheels of Albion into the World of Death:
And all the Gate of Los, clouded with clouds redounding from
Albion's dread Wheels, stretching out spaces immense between,
That every little particle of light & air became Opake,
Black & immense, a Rock of difficulty & a Cliff
Of black despair: that the immortal Wings labour'd against
Cliff after Cliff, & over Valleys of despair & death:
The narrow Sea between Albion & the Atlantic Continent,
Its waves of pearl became a boundless Ocean bottomless,
Of grey obscurity, fill'd with clouds & rocks & whirling waters,
And Albion's Sons ascending & descending in the horrid Void.

But as the Will must not be bended but in the day of Divine
Power: silent calm & motionless, in the mid-air sublime,
The Family Divine hover around the darkened Albion.

Such is the nature of the Ulro: that whatever enters,
Becomes Sexual, & is Created, and Vegetated, and Born.
From Hyde Park spread their vegetating roots beneath Albion,
In dreadful pain the Spectrous Uncircumcised Vegetation,

Forming a Sexual Machine, an Aged Virgin Form,
In Erin's Land toward the north, joint after joint, & burning
In love & jealousy immingled & calling it Religion.
And feeling the damps of death they with one accord delegated Los,
Conjuring him by the Highest that he should watch over them
Till Jesus shall appear: & they gave their power to Los
Naming him the Spirit of Prophecy, calling him Elijah.

Strucken with Albion's disease they become what they behold:
They assimilate with Albion in pity & compassion:
Their Emanations return not: their Spectres rage in the Deep.
The Slumbers of Death came over them around the Couch of Death,
Before the Gate of Los & in the depths of Non Entity,
Among the Furnaces of Los: among the Oaks of Albion.

Man is adjoin'd to Man by his Emanative portion,
Who is Jerusalem in every individual Man: and her
Shadow is Vala, builded by the Reasoning power in Man.
O search & see; turn your eyes upward: open, O thou World
Of Love & Harmony in Man: expand thy ever lovely Gates.

They wept into the deeps a little space: at length was heard
The voice of Bath, faint as the voice of the Dead in the House of Death,

BATH, healing City! whose wisdom, in midst of Poetic
Fervor, mild spoke thro' the Western Porch, in soft gentle tears.

O Albion, mildest Son of Eden! clos'd is thy Western Gate.
Brothers of Eternity: this Man whose great example
We all admir'd & lov'd, whose all benevolent countenance, seen
In Eden, in lovely Jerusalem, drew even from envy
The tear: and the confession of honesty, open & undisguis'd,
From mistrust and suspition. The Man is himself become
A piteous example of oblivion. To teach the Sons
Of Eden, that however great and glorious, however loving
And merciful the Individuality; however high
Our palaces and cities, and however fruitful are our fields
In Selfhood, we are nothing: but fade away in morning's breath.
Our mildness is nothing: the greatest mildness we can use
Is incapable and nothing: none but the Lamb of God can heal
This dread disease: none but Jesus: O Lord, descend and save.
Albion's Western Gate is clos'd: his death is coming apace:
Jesus alone can save him: for alas, we none can know
How soon his lot may be our own. When Africa in sleep
Rose in the night of Beulah, and bound down the Sun & Moon,
His friends cut his strong chains, & overwhelm'd his dark
Machines in fury & destruction, and the Man reviving repented.
He wept before his wrathful brethren, thankful & considerate

For their well timed wrath. But Albion's sleep is not
Like Africa's: and his machines are woven with his life.
'Nothing but mercy can save him! nothing but mercy, interposing
Lest he should slay Jerusalem in his fearful jealousy.
O God, descend! gather our brethren, deliver Jerusalem!
But that we may omit no office of the friendly spirit,
Oxford, take thou these leaves of the Tree of Life: with eloquence,
That thy immortal tongue inspires, present them to Albion:
Perhaps he may recieve them, offer 'd from thy loved hands.

So spoke, unheard by Albion, the merciful Son of Heaven
To those whose Western Gates were open, as they stood weeping
Around Albion: but Albion heard him not: obdurate, hard,
He frown'd on all his Friends, counting them enemies in his sorrow.

And the Seventeen conjoining with Bath, the Seventh,
In whom the other Ten shone manifest, a Divine Vision!
Assimilated and embrac'd Eternal Death for Albion's sake.
And these the names of the Eighteen combining with those Ten.

BATH, mild Physician of Eternity, mysterious power
Whose springs are unsearchable & knowledge infinite.
Hereford, ancient Guardian of Wales, whose hands
Builded the mountain palaces of Eden, stupendous works!
Lincoln, Durham & Carlisle, Councellors of Los,
And Ely, Scribe of Los, whose pen no other hand
Dare touch: Oxford, immortal Bard; with eloquence
Divine, he wept over Albion, speaking the words of God
In mild perswasion: bringing leaves of the Tree of Life.

Thou art in Error, Albion, the Land of Ulro:
One Error not remov'd, will destroy a human Soul.
Repose in Beulah's night, till the Error is remov'd:
Reason not on both sides. Repose upon our bosoms
Till the Plow of Jehovah, and the Harrow of Shaddai,
Have passed over the Dead, to awake the Dead to Judgment.
But Albion turn'd away refusing comfort.

Oxford trembled while he spoke, then fainted in the arms
Of Norwich, Peterboro, Rochester, Chester awful, Worcester,
Litchfield, Saint David's, Landaff, Asaph, Bangor, Sodor,
Bowing their heads devoted: and the Furnaces of Los
Began to rage, thundering loud the storms began to roar
Upon the Furnaces, and loud the Furnaces rebellow beneath.

And these the Four in whom the twenty-four appear'd four- fold:
Verulam, London, York, Edinburgh, mourning one towards another.

Alas! — The time will come, when a man's worst enemies
Shall be those of his own house and family: in a Religion
Of Generation, to destroy by Sin and Atonement happy Jerusalem,
The Bride and Wife of the Lamb. O God, thou art Not an Avenger!

FROM Camberwell to Highgate where the mighty Thames shudders along,
Where Los's Furnaces stand, where Jerusalem & Vala howl:
Luvah tore forth from Albion's Loins, in fibrous veins, in rivers
Of blood over Europe: a Vegetating Root in grinding pain,
Animating the Dragon Temples soon to become that Holy Fiend
The Wicker Man of Scandinavia, in which cruelly consumed
The Captives rear'd to heaven howl in flames among the stars.
Loud the cries of War on the Rhine & Danube, with Albion's Sons.
Away from Beulah's hills & vales break forth the Souls of the Dead,
With cymbal, trumpet, clarion, & the scythed chariots of Britain.

And the Veil of Vala is composed of the Spectres of the Dead.

Hark! the mingling cries of Luvah with the Sons of Albion.
Hark! & Record the terrible wonder! that the Punisher
Mingles with his Victim's Spectre, enslaved & tormented
To him whom he has murder'd, bound in vengeance & enmity.
Shudder not, but Write, & the hand of God will assist you!
Therefore I write Albion's last words. Hope is banish'd from me.

THESE were his last words, and the merciful Saviour in his arms
Reciev'd him, in the arms of tender mercy, and repos'd
The pale limbs of his Eternal Individuality
Upon the Rock of Ages. Then, surrounded with a Cloud,
In silence the Divine Lord builded, with immortal labour,
Of gold & jewels a sublime Ornament, a Couch of repose,
With Sixteen pillars: canopied with emblems & written verse,
Spiritual Verse, order'd & measur'd, from whence time shall reveal
The Five books of the Decalogue, the books of Joshua & Judges,
Samuel, a double book, & Kings, a double book, the Psalms & Prophets,
The Four-fold Gospel, and the Revelations everlasting.
Eternity groan'd & was troubled, at the image of Eternal Death!

Beneath the bottoms of the Graves, which is Earth's central joint,
There is a place where Contrarieties are equally true:
(To protect from the Giant blows in the sports of intellect,
Thunder in the midst of kindness, & love that kills its beloved:
Because Death is for a period, and they renew tenfold,)
From this sweet Place Maternal Love awoke Jerusalem:

With pangs she forsook Beulah's pleasant lovely shadowy Universe
Where no dispute can come: created for those who Sleep.

Weeping was in all Beulah, and all the Daughters of Beulah
Wept for their Sister the Daughter of Albion, Jerusalem:
When out of Beulah the Emanation of the Sleeper descended,
With solemn mourning out of Beulah's moony shades and hills,
Within the Human Heart, whose Gates closed with solemn sound.

And this the manner of the terrible Separation.
The Emanations of the grievously afflicted Friends of Albion
Concenter in one Female form, an Aged pensive Woman.
Astonish'd, lovely, embracing the sublime shade, the Daughters of Beulah
Beheld her with wonder! With awful hands she took
A Moment of Time, drawing it out with many tears & afflictions
And many sorrows: oblique across the Atlantic Vale,
Which is the Vale of Rephaim dreadful from East to West,
Where the Human Harvest waves abundant in the beams of Eden:
Into a Rainbow of jewels and gold, a mild Reflection from
Albion's dread Tomb. Eight thousand and five hundred years
In its extension. Every two hundred years has a door to Eden.
She also took an Atom of Space, with dire pain opening it a Center
Into Beulah: trembling the Daughters of Beulah dried
Her tears, she ardent embrac'd her sorrows, occupied in labours
Of sublime mercy in Rephaim's Vale. Perusing Albion's Tomb
She sat: she walk'd among the ornaments solemn mourning.
The Daughters attended her shudderings, wiping the death sweat.
Los also saw her in his seventh Furnace, he also terrified
Saw the finger of God go forth upon his seventh Furnace,
Away from the Starry Wheels to prepare Jerusalem a place.
When with a dreadful groan the Emanation mild of Albion
Burst from his bosom in the Tomb like a pale snowy cloud,
Female and lovely, struggling to put off the Human form,
Writhing in pain. The Daughters of Beulah in kind arms reciev'd
Jerusalem: weeping over her among the Spaces of Erin,
In the Ends of Beulah, where the Dead wail night & day.

And thus Erin spoke to the Daughters of Beulah, in soft tears.
Albion the Vortex of the Dead! Albion the Generous!
Albion the mildest son of Heaven! The Place of Holy Sacrifice!
Where Friends Die for each other: will become the Place
Of Murder, & Unforgiving, Never-awaking Sacrifice of Enemies.
The Children must be sacrific'd! (a horror never known
Till now in Beulah,) unless a Refuge can be found
To hide them from the wrath of Albion's Law that freezes sore
Upon his Sons & Daughters, self-exiled from his bosom.

Draw ye Jerusalem away from Albion's Mountains
To give a Place for Redemption, let Sihon and Og
Remove Eastward to Bashan and Gilead, and leave

THE secret coverts of Albion & the hidden places of America.
Jerusalem! Jerusalem! why wilt thou turn away?
Come ye O Daughters of Beulah, lament for Og & Sihon,
Upon the Lakes of Ireland from Rathlen to Baltimore:
Stand ye upon the Dargle from Wicklow to Drogheda,
Come & mourn over Albion the White Cliff of the Atlantic,
The Mountain of Giants: all the Giants of Albion are become
Weak, wither'd, darken'd: & Jerusalem is cast forth from Albion.
They deny that they ever knew Jerusalem, or ever dwelt in Shiloh.
The Gigantic roots & twigs of the vegetating Sons of Albion
Fill'd with the little-ones are consumed in the Fires of their Altars.
The vegetating Cities are burned & consumed from the Earth.
And the Bodies in which all Animals & Vegetations, the Earth & Heaven,
Were contain'd in All Glorious Imagination are wither'd & darken'd:
The golden Gate of Havilah, and all the Garden of God,
Was caught up with the Sun in one day of fury and war:
The Lungs, the Heart, the Liver, shrunk away far distant from Man
And left a little slimy substance floating upon the tides.
In one night the Atlantic Continent was caught up with the Moon,
And became an Opake Globe far distant clad with moony beams.
The Visions of Eternity, by reason of narrowed perceptions,
Are become weak Visions of Time & Space, fix'd into furrows of death:
Till deep dissimulation is the only defence an honest man has left.
O Polypus of Death, O Spectre over Europe and Asia,
Withering the Human Form by Laws of Sacrifice for Sin,
By Laws of Chastity & Abhorrence I am wither'd up,
Striving to Create a Heaven in which all shall be pure & holy
In their Own Selfhoods, in Natural Selfish Chastity: to banish Pity
And dear Mutual Forgiveness: & to become One Great Satan
Inslav'd to the most powerful Selfhood: to murder the Divine Humanity
In whose sight all are as the dust & who chargeth his Angels with folly!
Ah! weak & wide astray! Ah shut in narrow doleful form!
Creeping in reptile flesh upon the bosom of the ground!
The Eye of Man, a little narrow orb, clos'd up & dark,
Scarcely beholding the Great Light, conversing with the ground:
The Ear, a little shell, in small volutions shutting out
True Harmonies, & comprehending great, as very small:
The Nostrils, bent down to the earth & clos'd with senseless flesh,
That odours cannot them expand, nor joy on them exult:
The Tongue, a little moisture fills, a little food it cloys,
A little sound it utters, & its cries are faintly heard,

"Therefore they are removed: therefore they have taken root
In Egypt & Philistea: in Moab & Edom & Aram:
In the Erythrean Sea their Uncircumcision in Heart & Loins
Be lost for ever & ever, then they shall arise from Self
By Self Annihilation into Jerusalem's Courts & into Shiloh,
Shiloh, the Masculine Emanation among the flowers of Beulah
Lo, Shiloh dwells over France, as Jerusalem dwells over Albion.
Build & prepare a Wall & Curtain for America's shore!
Rush on! Rush on! Rush on! ye vegetating Sons of Albion!
The Sun shall go before you in Day: the Moon shall go
Before you in Night. Come on! Come on! Come on! The Lord
Jehovah is before, behind, above, beneath, around.
He has builded the arches of Albion's Tomb, binding the Stars
In merciful Order, bending the Laws of Cruelty to Peace.
He hath placed Og & Anak, the Giants of Albion, for their Guards:
Building the Body of Moses in the Valley of Peor: the Body
Of Divine Analogy: and Og & Sihon in the tears of Balaam,
The Son of Beor, have given their power to Joshua & Caleb.
Remove from Albion, far remove these terrible surfaces.
They are beginning to form Heavens & Hells in immense
Circles: the Hells for food to the Heavens: food of torment,
Food of despair: they drink the condemnd Soul & rejoice
In cruel holiness, in their Heavens of Chastity & Uncircumcision.
Yet they are blameless & Iniquity must be imputed only
To the State they are enter'd into that they may be deliver 'd:
Satan is the State of Death, & not a Human existence:
But Luvah is named Satan, because he has enter'd that State.
A World where Man is by Nature the Enemy of Man,
Because the Evil is Created into a State, that Men
May be deliver'd time after time, evermore. Amen.
Learn therefore, O Sisters, to distinguish the Eternal Human
That walks about among the stones of fire, in bliss & woe
Alternate, from those States or Worlds in which the Spirit travels:
This is the only means to Forgiveness of Enemies.
Therefore remove from Albion these terrible Surfaces
And let wild seas & rocks close up Jerusalem away from

THE Atlantic Mountains where Giants dwelt in Intellect:
Now given to stony Druids, and Allegoric Generation,
To the Twelve Gods of Asia, the Spectres of those who Sleep:
Sway'd by a Providence oppos'd to the Divine Lord Jesus:
A murderous Providence! A Creation that groans, living on Death,
Where Fish & Bird & Beast & Man & Tree & Metal & Stone
Live by Devouring, going into Eternal Death continually!
Albion is now possess'd by the War of Blood! the Sacrifice
Of envy Albion is become, and his Emanation cast out:

Come Lord Jesus, Lamb of God descend! for if, O Lord!
If thou hadst been here, our brother Albion had not died.
Arise sisters! Go ye & meet the Lord, while I remain.
Behold the foggy mornings of the Dead on Albion's cliffs:
Ye know that if the Emanation remains in them
She will become an Eternal Death, an Avenger of Sin,
A Self-righteousness: the proud Virgin-Harlot! Mother of War!
And we also, & all Beulah, consume beneath Albion's curse.

So Erin spoke to the Daughters of Beulah. Shuddering
With their wings they sat in the Furnace, in a night
Of stars, for all the Sons of Albion appear'd distant stars,
Ascending and descending into Albion's sea of death.
And Erin's lovely Bow enclos'd the Wheels of Albion's Sons.

Expanding on wing, the Daughters of Beulah replied in sweet response.

Come, O thou Lamb of God, and take away the remembrance of Sin.
To Sin & to hide the Sin in sweet deceit, is lovely!
To Sin in the open face of day is cruel & pitiless! But
To record the Sin for a reproach: to let the Sun go down
In a remembrance of the Sin; is a Woe & a Horror,
A brooder of an Evil Day, and a Sun rising in blood!
Come then, O Lamb of God, and take away the remembrance of Sin.