Quotes from William Blake

What the hammer? What the Chains? In what furnace was thy brain? Where the anvil? What dread grasp? Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

The difference between a good artist and a bad one is: the bad artist seems to copy a great deal, the good one really does.

He who would do good to another must do it in Minute Particulars: General Good is the plea of the scoundrel, hypocrite & flatterer..

The emmet's inch and eagle's mile Make lame philosophy to smile. He who doubts from what he sees Will ne'er believe, do what you please. - Auguries of Innocence

The Lily of the valley, breathing in the humble grass Answer'd the lovely maid and said: I am a watry weed, And I am very small, and love to dwell in lowly vales; So weak, the gilded butterfly scarce perches on my head; Yet I am visited from heaven, and he that smiles on all Walks in the valley and each morn over me spreads his hand, Saying: 'Rejoice, thou humble grass, thou new-born lily flower

In a wife I would desire / What in whores is always found / The lineaments of gratified desire.

Energy is the only life and is from the Body and Reason is the bound or outward circumference of Energy.

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.

The morning comes, the night decays, the watchmen leave their stations.

And throughout all Eternity I forgive you, you forgive me. As our dear Redeemer said: "This the Wine, and this the Bread.

In every cry of every man, In every infant's cry of fear, In every voice, in every ban, The mind-forged manacles I hear.

La Eternidad está enamorada de las obras del tiempo.

Joys impregnate. Sorrows bring forth.

Everything that lives, lives not alone, nor for itself.

If a thing loves, it is infinite. ( Annotations to Swedenborg )

A flower was offered to me, Such a flower as May never bore; But I said I've a pretty rose tree, And I passed the sweet flower o'er. Then I went to my pretty rose tree, To tend her by day and by night; But my rose turned away with jealousy, And her thorns were my only delight.

I know of no other Christianity and of no other Gospel than the liberty both of body & mind to exercise the Divine Arts of Imagination Imagination the real & eternal World of which this Vegetable Universe is but a faint shadow & in which we shall live in our Eternal or Imaginative Bodies, when these Vegetable Mortal Bodies are no more. The Apostles knew of no other Gospel.

You cannot have Liberty in this world without what you call Moral Virtue, and you cannot have Moral Virtue without the slavery of that half of the human race who hate what you call Moral Virtue.

Joy and woe are woven fine, a clothing for the soul divine. Under every grief and pine, runs a joy with silken twine.

Arise you little glancing wings, and sing your infant joy! Arise and drink your bliss, for every thing that lives is holy!

Ah Sun-flower! weary of time, Who countest the steps of the Sun: Seeking after that sweet golden clime Where the traveller's journey is done. Where the Youth pined away with desire, And the pale Virgin shrouded in snow: Arise from their graves and aspire, Where my Sun-flower wishes to go.

A truth that's told with bad intent Beats all the lies you can invent.

If you have form'd a Circle to go into, / Go into it yourself & see how you would do.

Love is the child that breathes our breath. Love is the child that scatters death.